Speaker 1: Hey their podcast listeners. Thanks so much for subscribing to
Speaker 1: the show. So this week's show is recorded, but a
Speaker 1: lot of it is brand new. So the intro is new,
Speaker 1: the emails are new, the voicemails are new, the interviews
Speaker 1: are new. The only thing that is previously recorded are
Speaker 1: the calls. So enjoy the show. Thanks so much for
Speaker 1: listening and subscribing. What's going on. I'm Rich Demiro and
Speaker 1: this is Rich on Tech, the show where I talk
Speaker 1: about the tech stuff I think you should know about.
Speaker 1: It's also the place where I answer your questions about technology.
Speaker 1: I believe that tech should be interesting, useful, and fun.
Speaker 1: The phone number to the show is triple eight Rich
Speaker 1: one oh one. That's eight eight eight seven four to
Speaker 1: two four one zero one. You can also email me.
Speaker 1: Just go to Rich on tech dot tv hit the
Speaker 1: link that says contact. We've got some great guests this week.
Speaker 1: Jacob Palm of Best Reviews dot com will join us
Speaker 1: to share top rated gift ideas that you can shop
Speaker 1: for this holiday season. Jen Collchrider of Mozilla Foundation's Privacy
Speaker 1: Not Included. We'll talk about their new report, which highlights
Speaker 1: gadget privacy concerns with all the smart stuff that we're buying,
Speaker 1: and Matt Swider of the shortcut dot Com we'll talk
Speaker 1: about some of the best holiday shopping strategies. I hope
Speaker 1: you had a RESTful, enjoyable, and gratitude filled Thanksgiving. I
Speaker 1: wanted to talk to you about some of my favorite
Speaker 1: apps on my phone. I figured, since it is a
Speaker 1: holiday weekend, maybe you're doing some shopping, maybe you're doing
Speaker 1: some personalization on your phone, maybe you're getting things set
Speaker 1: up the way you want on your smartphone. Maybe you
Speaker 1: got a new smartphone already. But I figured ou'd go
Speaker 1: over some of the apps that I keep on my
Speaker 1: phone that I really like. And I'm pretty particular. I've
Speaker 1: really like apps that are cross platform, which means they
Speaker 1: work equally well on both iPhone and Android. The reason
Speaker 1: for that is pretty simple. I don't want to be
Speaker 1: locked into any one platform. Some of these apps are
Speaker 1: only available on one platform or another, but for the
Speaker 1: majority of them, they are available on both. Some of
Speaker 1: them do require a subscription fee, others are completely free.
Speaker 1: Let's go through some of the apps that I really
Speaker 1: enjoy so and these are in no particular order, but
Speaker 1: the first app is called Artifact. Artifact and this is
Speaker 1: a personalized news app. It's all powered by AI. It
Speaker 1: was started by some of the same folks behind Instagram,
Speaker 1: and so the idea is that it's kind of like
Speaker 1: an Instagram but for articles. So the more you look
Speaker 1: at and read different articles, the more it will serve
Speaker 1: you up similar articles. And that does work across Android
Speaker 1: and iOS. All right, so I know there's a big
Speaker 1: question about which photo storage app to use. My favorite
Speaker 1: has been for many, many years, ever since it was
Speaker 1: Kasa back in the day, is Google Photos. I love
Speaker 1: Google Photos because it is cross platform, it works really well.
Speaker 1: It ties into my Google storage. I think that these
Speaker 1: search capabilities are unmatched on this app, So get your
Speaker 1: photos into Google Photos. My only downside is the more
Speaker 1: photos you have inside here backed up, the tougher it
Speaker 1: is to actually get them out using takeout. But I'll
Speaker 1: figure that out one of these days. Chat GBT installed
Speaker 1: on my phones. I love this AI chatbot. It is
Speaker 1: just an impressive, impressive debut of AI. If you don't
Speaker 1: have the official chat GPT app on your phone, I
Speaker 1: highly recommend you download it. I pay for a subscription
Speaker 1: to chat GBT, which gives me access to a couple
Speaker 1: more features, but they did just make one premium feature free,
Speaker 1: and that is voice chat. So if you want to
Speaker 1: chat with an AI bot using your voice, download the
Speaker 1: chat GBT app and hit the microphone icon and you
Speaker 1: can do just that. This is a relatively new app
Speaker 1: looking for a good read it later app. So I
Speaker 1: was using Pocket for a long time, but I just
Speaker 1: switched to this app called omnivore O m n i
Speaker 1: v ore. It is cross platform. It works a little
Speaker 1: bit better on iOS as some apps do, but this
Speaker 1: is a free, open source read it later app and
Speaker 1: I really like it because they are privacy focused. You
Speaker 1: can throw anything you want in there, whether it's a
Speaker 1: PDF or an article. It formats it in a nice
Speaker 1: way that you can read it later, and it also
Speaker 1: has labels so you can categorize your items into labels.
Speaker 1: And I just find that I don't know, I discovered
Speaker 1: it and it's it's a pretty cool app. So omnivore
Speaker 1: for reading it later. Email me. This is a great app,
Speaker 1: and I wish, wish wish this was cross platform. This
Speaker 1: is only available on the iPhone for some reason. There
Speaker 1: is a similar app on Android, but I don't necessarily
Speaker 1: like it as much. And I haven't found one that
Speaker 1: I like as much as this one. But email Me
Speaker 1: is just such a great app, and it's just an
Speaker 1: easy way to email yourself notes, links, anything you want.
Speaker 1: My email inbox is kind of my to do list,
Speaker 1: like an ongoing like I'm always going to see whatever's
Speaker 1: in there, and so if I email myself an article
Speaker 1: or whatever it is, anything, I can just deal with
Speaker 1: it when I'm sitting down at my computer and I
Speaker 1: have a chance to look at my inbox and say, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I want to read this, or I want to act
Speaker 1: on this, or I want to do this or whatever.
Speaker 1: Telegram is my preferred chat app. We picked this a
Speaker 1: long time ago with my family, so we're all on there.
Speaker 1: We have a nice, big group chat and I just
Speaker 1: love it because it works the same way across iPhone
Speaker 1: and Android, so no matter what phone my family members
Speaker 1: are using, we all have the same exact chat day one.
Speaker 1: I wish I use this more. This is a journaling app,
Speaker 1: but it's just really simple. It's very clean, it's easy,
Speaker 1: and if you want to start journaling in the new
Speaker 1: year again, it's cross platform and I like that Apple
Speaker 1: is adding a journal app to their seventeen, but it's
Speaker 1: not cross platform, so anything you do in there will
Speaker 1: be stuck on iPhone forever. I like Day one because
Speaker 1: it goes with me. Libby is a great app if
Speaker 1: you haven't downloaded Libby, it is such a great resource
Speaker 1: for free books and audiobooks. I absolutely love Libby. Let's
Speaker 1: see Opener. This is a again. This is an iOS
Speaker 1: only app. Opener is an app that lets you open
Speaker 1: up the link in the proper app. So, for instance,
Speaker 1: on iOS, everything's sort of sandboxed, and that means that
Speaker 1: if you go to a YouTube video on an app,
Speaker 1: it may just open inside a small browser inside that app.
Speaker 1: With Opener, you can actually open that up in the
Speaker 1: proper app by just pressing the share button, and then
Speaker 1: it will figure out which app it should open up
Speaker 1: in and it will do that. It's a really handy app.
Speaker 1: I think it costs about two dollars. There's an app
Speaker 1: called What three Words. I really wish more people knew about.
Speaker 1: What three Words divides the world into small three meter
Speaker 1: by three meter squares, and each one of them has
Speaker 1: a unique three word address, which means you can tell
Speaker 1: someone where you are exactly using three words. But I
Speaker 1: find that it's very handy for directing people to a
Speaker 1: certain entrance somewhere. So if you're meeting someone at say
Speaker 1: a big park, you know GPS is only going to
Speaker 1: get you to the park with what three words, you
Speaker 1: can show them the exact place you are at that park,
Speaker 1: whether it's a certain entrance or a certain area. It
Speaker 1: is really really handy. Whisper Memos I love this app.
Speaker 1: I have it installed on my Apple Watch. And again
Speaker 1: this is a an iOS only but it is so great.
Speaker 1: It uses AI to record and transcribe audio notes and
Speaker 1: memos and it's just really really incredible at what it does. Again,
Speaker 1: you get some for free, but then they do charge
Speaker 1: you just a little bit. Sunshine Contacts is a great
Speaker 1: contact app. This helps you manage your contacts by automatically
Speaker 1: updating their information by looking in their signature in your
Speaker 1: email and so if they have a new phone number
Speaker 1: or something in there, it will attempt to merge all
Speaker 1: that information. It's not perfect, but it does work and
Speaker 1: it's pretty good. I like that. Run out of time here,
Speaker 1: but Amazon Photos is great for free unlimited photo storage
Speaker 1: if you are a Prime member. Backdrops is great for wallpaper.
Speaker 1: Splice is great for video editing. Touch Retouch is great
Speaker 1: to remove unwanted objects from your photos. It is so easy.
Speaker 1: Fly fin Ai is a great app if you're a
Speaker 1: freelancer and you have expenses that you want to remember
Speaker 1: for tax time. Upside is a great app if you
Speaker 1: want to get cash back on your gas and grocery purchases.
Speaker 1: Let's see Real Good is my preferred streaming service guide,
Speaker 1: so I use that to keep track of all the
Speaker 1: movies I want to see. Recipe Keeper is incredible. You
Speaker 1: can forward a URL to a recipe and it parses
Speaker 1: the data in that recipe and puts it in an
Speaker 1: easy to follow format and organizes it all. It is
Speaker 1: really good at what it does. Two more apps. One
Speaker 1: is called All Trails. It's great for finding hiking, walking,
Speaker 1: and running trails no matter where you are in the world.
Speaker 1: And Flighty, which will help you get around the world.
Speaker 1: It is a great flight tracker. It's available on iOS only.
Speaker 1: It is beautifully designed. I hope they come to Android.
Speaker 1: You can find links to all of the apps I
Speaker 1: just mentioned on my website. Just go to Rich on
Speaker 1: tech dot TV. Coming up on the show, we'll talk
Speaker 1: to Matt Swider of the shortcut about holiday shopping strategies.
Speaker 1: But first it's your turn. Your calls up next. My
Speaker 1: name is rich D Muro and you are listening to
Speaker 1: rich on Tech. Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich
Speaker 1: Demiro here hanging out with you, talking technology at triple
Speaker 1: eight rich one oh one eight eight eight seven four
Speaker 1: to two four one zero one. Email is also an option.
Speaker 1: You can go to the website rich on Tech dot TV.
Speaker 1: Hit contact. Let's see. Let's get to a question here.
Speaker 1: You guys send me so many questions, so let's see.
Speaker 1: Isabelle says, my daughter has a brand new Apple Watch.
Speaker 1: She does know I want to use. I would like
Speaker 1: to use it because I think they are very nice looking. However,
Speaker 1: I have an Android cell phone. I don't care to
Speaker 1: connect it, nor do I care to switch to an
Speaker 1: Apple cell phone. My question is can I still use it?
Speaker 1: The only thing I actually want to use is the
Speaker 1: time and the watch. I only want to see the time.
Speaker 1: Is this possible, please help Isabelle. Yes, it is possible,
Speaker 1: and there is a setting for the Apple Watch. You
Speaker 1: do need an iPhone to set up an Apple Watch,
Speaker 1: but once it's set up, it will work on its own.
Speaker 1: And I don't think you're gonna get the full benefit
Speaker 1: of having an Apple Watch. But if you just want
Speaker 1: the time, like you're saying, then sup. You can absolutely
Speaker 1: do this and it will do some other basic things
Speaker 1: as well. Now, I do think you're gonna need to
Speaker 1: set up an iCloud account to do this, so if
Speaker 1: you don't have that, it's free, you can do that.
Speaker 1: But the feature is called family setup, and you actually
Speaker 1: need to use your daughter's iPhone to do this. So
Speaker 1: once you reset the Apple Watch, go into settings and
Speaker 1: factory reset it. That'll bring it to like a fresh start.
Speaker 1: Use your phone, your daughter's iPhone to set up the
Speaker 1: Apple Watch, and it will say are you setting this
Speaker 1: up for yourself or a family member? And you are
Speaker 1: the family member, so say yes, I'm setting this up
Speaker 1: for a family member, and it will guide you through
Speaker 1: the process of setting up that phone for you and
Speaker 1: not her phone, so all of your stuff will be
Speaker 1: just on the watch. It will be separate from anything
Speaker 1: that she has on her account. But like I said,
Speaker 1: you will need to log in with your own iCloud
Speaker 1: account just so that Apple can keep track of everything
Speaker 1: and make sure that you've got your own account on there.
Speaker 1: So you can set that up for free during the
Speaker 1: setup time, and if you just want to use the
Speaker 1: time and the watch, that's fine, but you can use
Speaker 1: other features. I mean, you could use like you know,
Speaker 1: the Stopwatch, the calendar. My kids have Apple Watches and
Speaker 1: they use them independent of a phone, and they do
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of stuff. They've even downloaded little games
Speaker 1: on there. So there are definitely things you can do
Speaker 1: on the Apple Watch even if you don't have an iPhone.
Speaker 1: And this is because a lot of people use these
Speaker 1: for their kids or even adults that you know may
Speaker 1: have a disability or something like that. You want to
Speaker 1: be able to keep track of them or have this
Speaker 1: watch on their wrist. But they're not necessarily using an iPhone.
Speaker 1: So there are many many reasons why you might want
Speaker 1: to set this up this way, but it can be
Speaker 1: done very easily. A good question Isabelle, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for writing. Let's see. Rob from Los Angeles says, Hey, Rich,
Speaker 1: I follow you on social media and your podcast, and
Speaker 1: I think you're pretty funny and informative. Oh well, thank you, Rob.
Speaker 1: I have a question about two factor authentication apps. I
Speaker 1: use two fa open source app and Microsoft Authenticator app.
Speaker 1: On my accounts. What if I want to stop using
Speaker 1: Microsoft Authenticator and switch to the two FA app? Will
Speaker 1: that create conflict since my accounts were accepting codes generated
Speaker 1: by the app the Microsoft app before, or do I
Speaker 1: have to stick with the same authenticator app once I
Speaker 1: attach the account to one app. Please explain. Thanks in advance.
Speaker 1: Rob in Los Angeles, Rob, great question. Now it's interesting
Speaker 1: because I don't talk about the two factor authentication apps
Speaker 1: too much, but I think they are very, very important.
Speaker 1: And if you've heard of me talk about securing your
Speaker 1: online accounts, there are two ways you do that. Number
Speaker 1: one very strong password, unique password for every account, and
Speaker 1: then the second way is with a two factor authentication
Speaker 1: enabled on your account. And there are two ways of
Speaker 1: doing that. And this is why it gets a little
Speaker 1: bit complicated. And I don't want to I don't want
Speaker 1: people to be detracted from doing this right like I
Speaker 1: want them to do this. So I want to make
Speaker 1: it as simple as possible. And the simplest way to
Speaker 1: do two factor authentication is with the text message code.
Speaker 1: And so you put in your phone number on something
Speaker 1: like Instagram and it says, hey, we're going to text
Speaker 1: you every time you try to log in. If you
Speaker 1: don't give us that secret code that we text you,
Speaker 1: we're not going to allow this log in to happen. Well,
Speaker 1: the problem is that the cell phones and phone numbers
Speaker 1: are a little bit easier hacked than we'd like, and
Speaker 1: so some people could get a hold of your cell
Speaker 1: phone number or intercept that code and hack you still
Speaker 1: even if you have two factor on, but it's still
Speaker 1: a very good way to protect your account in most,
Speaker 1: like ninety nine percent of cases. But if you really
Speaker 1: want to be safe and secure, what you want to
Speaker 1: do is use one of these two factor authentication apps.
Speaker 1: And what these apps do is they generate a unique
Speaker 1: code every thirty seconds or so, and when you want
Speaker 1: to log in, you just go to this app and
Speaker 1: you check out the code and you just type it
Speaker 1: in and again that's the second factor. The first is
Speaker 1: you logging into the account. The second is this app
Speaker 1: that is generating a code. Now, the app is nice
Speaker 1: because it is independent of your phone number. So if
Speaker 1: you switch phone lines, if you get a different carrier,
Speaker 1: if you get rid of your phone number altogether, you
Speaker 1: don't lose those ways to log into your account because
Speaker 1: you can no longer access those codes. You can get
Speaker 1: them on this app no matter what service you're using.
Speaker 1: So that's why I like to use this service whenever possible.
Speaker 1: And there are apps called Authie, there are Google Authenticator,
Speaker 1: there's Microsoft Authenticator. There are several of these authentication apps
Speaker 1: out there. You just have to pick one that you like.
Speaker 1: I would personally say pick one that does not have
Speaker 1: any any sort of cost because you don't want to
Speaker 1: be paying for this down the line over time. So
Speaker 1: the question rob is can you switch apps? And I
Speaker 1: had to do some research on this one, but I
Speaker 1: looked up on Wired had an article about this, and
Speaker 1: it's funny because I've been not wanting to switch because
Speaker 1: it is a time consuming process, but it can be done.
Speaker 1: And so, as I suspected, you basically have to disable
Speaker 1: the two factor authentication temporarily and then re enable it
Speaker 1: using the new app. And the way that you do
Speaker 1: that is, once you enable it, typically you just scan
Speaker 1: a QR code on your screen to enable this two
Speaker 1: factor authentication. It links up and then all of your
Speaker 1: codes are right on that app. So, for instance, I
Speaker 1: use an app and I've got all of my codes
Speaker 1: on here for Twitter, I've got it for my Facebook
Speaker 1: I've got it for my website at work, I've got
Speaker 1: it for my Instagram, And so, of course the number
Speaker 1: one thing you're thinking is, well, what if someone hacks
Speaker 1: that app? Yeah, you've got to be careful. And this
Speaker 1: is why you have to have password on your phone
Speaker 1: or face ID or a fingerprint scanner, and there is
Speaker 1: a log in for that app as well. So again,
Speaker 1: all of these things do require a little bit of planning,
Speaker 1: a little bit of kind of just setting things up
Speaker 1: so that they work. And I know people get very
Speaker 1: hesitant to set this stuff up because it sounds so
Speaker 1: complicated and it feels like you're never gonna be able
Speaker 1: to get into your logins when you need to. But
Speaker 1: believe me, I will tell you I get emails every
Speaker 1: single day, every single day from people that get hacked
Speaker 1: on Facebook, on Instagram, on their email. And when you
Speaker 1: do that, there is no guarantee that you're getting that
Speaker 1: account back. And I have people that are saying, rich,
Speaker 1: I have my photos on there, I have my emails,
Speaker 1: I have all kinds of personal data that I will
Speaker 1: never be able to get back, And I say, you
Speaker 1: know what, I'm sorry, but the reality is you have
Speaker 1: to lock down these accounts, and most people just don't
Speaker 1: want to and if you don't, you will be hacked
Speaker 1: telling you that because it's not not like they're they're
Speaker 1: targeting you, they are just coming after a lot of people.
Speaker 1: Rich on Tech is my website, rich on tech dot tv.
Speaker 1: Go ahead, check me out on Instagram at rich on tech. Earlier,
Speaker 1: we had a question about running an older software operating
Speaker 1: system on a computer and I found a good website,
Speaker 1: end of life dot Date. And this has the end
Speaker 1: of life dates for every platform you could ever imagine,
Speaker 1: the iPhone, the iPad iOS, iPadOS, macOS, Windows. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is pretty thorough. So someone clearly does their homework
Speaker 1: with this website end of life dot date. And so
Speaker 1: if you look at Apple macOS, it says all the
Speaker 1: different releases you got Sonoma, Ventura, Monterey, Big Sur and Catalina,
Speaker 1: and it tells you the service status, if it's still
Speaker 1: being serviced, and when it got its latest software update.
Speaker 1: So if you look at this, macOS eleven, twelve, thirteen,
Speaker 1: and fourteen are still all getting software updates. And Big
Speaker 1: Sir was so released two years and eleven months ago.
Speaker 1: Service status yes, latest update was September eleventh. Then September
Speaker 1: twenty first for the Quanarey, Ventura, Sonoma. So anyway, great
Speaker 1: website to see if the software you want to run
Speaker 1: is still being secure, supported with active security updates. Triple
Speaker 1: eight rich one O one eight eight eight seven four
Speaker 1: to two four one zero one. Give me a call.
Speaker 1: Do you have a question about technology? My name is
Speaker 1: rich Dmiro and you are listening to rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich Demiro here hanging
Speaker 1: out with you talking technology at Triple eight rich one
Speaker 1: oh one.
Speaker 2: This is it.
Speaker 1: This is the holiday shopping season. We are in full swing,
Speaker 1: in the thick of it. And joining me now is
Speaker 1: Matt Swider of the Shortcut dot Com, a newsletter which
Speaker 1: aims to simplify your life. Matt, thanks so much for joining.
Speaker 3: Me, Thanks for having me. This is graduated, all right.
Speaker 1: So tell me why you started the shortcut dot com.
Speaker 1: You said to simplify folks lives. Do you think there's
Speaker 1: an over abundance of information out there?
Speaker 4: Yeah, especially when you're reading content and the keyword, the
Speaker 4: answer that you're looking for is buried in the fifth paragraph.
Speaker 1: It's not just you.
Speaker 3: That's really a tactic that people use to keep you
Speaker 3: on the page. I want to give you the quickest answer.
Speaker 4: And when I was helping people find a PS five
Speaker 4: in stock, I just was shooting out links so that
Speaker 4: they would get the item they wanted. And that's happening
Speaker 4: all over again with a bunch of other items that
Speaker 4: people want, including the PlayStation portal, so trying to get
Speaker 4: the people they answer as quickly as possible.
Speaker 1: So how are the deals shaping up this holiday shopping season.
Speaker 1: They're pretty good.
Speaker 4: A lot of people really want cheap TVs and they
Speaker 4: want that PlayStation portal. They also want a lot of
Speaker 4: the Apple Watch is really popular, and of course every
Speaker 4: year it's the air pods. AirPods are the number one
Speaker 4: gift because it's an easy stocking stuffer. It counts as
Speaker 4: the big gifts for a lot people. If you get
Speaker 4: that airpod's pro too, and that's down to one hundred
Speaker 4: and sixty nine dollars, So that's a really good price
Speaker 4: if you find it out there for that because those
Speaker 4: the stock on that is very limited.
Speaker 1: So we're kind of in the thick of it every
Speaker 1: day we're tracking these prices. We know kind of like
Speaker 1: how much these things sell for. But if you just
Speaker 1: see a price online. You don't always know if that's
Speaker 1: the best price, if it's kind of you know, you
Speaker 1: see these wild discounts, you know, thirty percent off, forty
Speaker 1: percent off. What was anyone actually paying that full price?
Speaker 1: So how do we know when something's an actual deal
Speaker 1: and not just marked up to be discounted.
Speaker 4: That's a great question, because, yeah, a lot of retailers,
Speaker 4: especially the Samsungers of the world, will launch at a
Speaker 4: huge price for those early adopters and then just drop
Speaker 4: it off by half over the course of a year.
Speaker 4: You'll see those launch prices and there will be the
Speaker 4: list price. They'll be crossed out, and that's great. But
Speaker 4: usually using tools like Camel Camel Camel, which I still
Speaker 4: use tried and true, that will give you some insight
Speaker 4: at least if the prices dropped recently or if it's
Speaker 4: you know, been lower before. I use that a lot,
Speaker 4: but a lot of price tracking tools on Twitter, that's
Speaker 4: what I use. I use a discord and I have
Speaker 4: like things pinging me, so I take that information from
Speaker 4: a discord where it's automatically tracking the prices and putting
Speaker 4: it out on Twitter and sending people notifications.
Speaker 1: What do you think are some of the best ways
Speaker 1: to research a product to see if it's worthwhile.
Speaker 4: Yeah, a lot of reviews out there will tell you
Speaker 4: if the price is going to be discount nowadays because
Speaker 4: their method is sending you affiliate links, and that actually
Speaker 4: acts as a really good way to get an updated review.
Speaker 4: So a lot of the reviews and buying guides out
Speaker 4: there still hold a lot of weight for a lot
Speaker 4: of consumers because they google something, they find that information,
Speaker 4: and now they're being updated a lot more than work
Speaker 4: in past years because they want to fulfill that e
Speaker 4: commerce revenue. Well, that really helps out a lot of
Speaker 4: people because they'll they'll always tell you the lowest price.
Speaker 1: Okay, so this is something that I always get. People
Speaker 1: email me a link to something and say, Rich, this
Speaker 1: is a really good price. How do you know if
Speaker 1: something is too good to be true? Is it just
Speaker 1: based on the retailer. I don't want to like discount
Speaker 1: you know, any company I haven't heard of and not
Speaker 1: shop there ever again. But at the same time, I
Speaker 1: don't want to get ripped off.
Speaker 4: Yeah, a simple Google search if you haven't heard of
Speaker 4: the main brand, usually that's a bad sign. Yeah, you
Speaker 4: want to shop at the you know, for the lowest price.
Speaker 4: But there are some websites that are not well put together,
Speaker 4: don't have anything in the footer, and look pretty scammy. Yeah,
Speaker 4: if it's too good to be true, it usually is,
Speaker 4: and I would avoid that as much as possible. Go
Speaker 4: with places that you know until you're familiar with it,
Speaker 4: until a friend says, I bought this at X shop.
Speaker 4: You've never heard of it before, but at least there's
Speaker 4: some sort of testimonial there.
Speaker 1: I always check for the return policy and the contact
Speaker 1: information as well, because if you can't find those two
Speaker 1: before you make a purchase, you're definitely not going to
Speaker 1: find them after you make a purchase.
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: What about the difference between shopping online and shopping in store.
Speaker 1: I know that you love to take your pictures outside
Speaker 1: the Best Buy and all these places where you find
Speaker 1: these products. Do you have better luck one way or
Speaker 1: the other?
Speaker 4: I have better luck online, And what I tell people
Speaker 4: is shop online, reserve it for in store, pickup. That way,
Speaker 4: you're guaranteed to get that price if it happens to
Speaker 4: be cheaper in the store for some reason. Usually they're
Speaker 4: pretty good at keeping parody with you know, in store
Speaker 4: prices and online prices, but if it happens to be
Speaker 4: cheaper in the store, then you can just cancel that
Speaker 4: order when you get there and pick it up for
Speaker 4: a store price, So you know, you get in the
Speaker 4: best of both worlds by shopping that way.
Speaker 1: What about price matching? Do retailers even price match this
Speaker 1: time of the year or they over that they do.
Speaker 4: There are some retailers that do, but a lot of
Speaker 4: times the item has to be in stock. So if
Speaker 4: you go to best Buy, for example, and something is
Speaker 4: at Amazon but it's not quite in stock, but it
Speaker 4: was in stock, well, they won't price match that.
Speaker 3: So that's a little bit of a caveat.
Speaker 4: But if you do your dute diligence and you you
Speaker 4: screenshot something, maybe you'll talk to, you know, someone at
Speaker 4: the retail shop and they'll they'll give you that best price.
Speaker 3: So always take screenshots. That's one of the big tips
Speaker 3: out there.
Speaker 1: Now. One of the ways that you've amassed such a
Speaker 1: large following was helping people find hard to find products.
Speaker 1: Is it the case anymore? Are people? Are these products
Speaker 1: sold out? You mentioned that the PlayStation portal is tough
Speaker 1: to find. Tell me about some of the products to
Speaker 1: year that we may have trouble getting our hands on
Speaker 1: or are all of those inventory issues a thing in
Speaker 1: the past.
Speaker 3: For the most part, the inventory issues are a thing
Speaker 3: of the past.
Speaker 4: There's some key items, some you know, Disney merchandise that
Speaker 4: people want that's really hard to get.
Speaker 3: PlayStation portal is the impossible.
Speaker 4: Thing to find right now, and besides that, it's finding
Speaker 4: things that are usually readily available at the best possible price.
Speaker 4: So if you're going to spend you know, two hundred
Speaker 4: dollars on the AirPods, you're overpaying. But that one hundred
Speaker 4: and sixty nine dollars deal for the AirPods Pro two,
Speaker 4: well that's what's hard to get these days. So that's
Speaker 4: where I still come in to play for a lot
Speaker 4: of people.
Speaker 1: I noticed this trend of retailers reserving their best prices
Speaker 1: for their members. Now Amazon's been doing that forever, but
Speaker 1: now we're seeing Walmart Plus, we're seeing Best Buy, which
Speaker 1: you just mentioned. They have some sort of program and
Speaker 1: target obviously Target Circle, but that's free to join. So
Speaker 1: tell me about this trend.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think the margins are becoming slim at all
Speaker 4: these retailers. You know, they made very little if nothing
Speaker 4: on the PlayStation five, for example. So they said, all right,
Speaker 4: we have these hot products, but we're not making any
Speaker 4: money off of it. So what they were doing was
Speaker 4: locking the hot products behind and their best deals behind
Speaker 4: a paywall, which you know, for example, Walmart Plus, they
Speaker 4: saw what Amazon was doing, they said, okay, let's encourage
Speaker 4: people to get our two day free shipping pay fifty
Speaker 4: to one hundred dollars a year. They used to be
Speaker 4: one hundred dollars a year, but they dropped down fifty
Speaker 4: for the time being, and they were, you know, locking
Speaker 4: really key deals. And they're continuing to do that at
Speaker 4: least for three hours during the Black Friday push. So
Speaker 4: they're saying, okay, we're not making a lot of money
Speaker 4: off of electronics. At least we're making fifty dollars ahead
Speaker 4: off of each household. So that is a tactic that
Speaker 4: consumers don't love, but they in the end do love
Speaker 4: the benefits because fifty dollars a year for something that's
Speaker 4: equivalent to Amazon Prime is a pretty good deal.
Speaker 3: If Walmart is your number one retailer.
Speaker 1: All right, so do you have any recommendations for us,
Speaker 1: Do you have anything that we should be on the
Speaker 1: lookout for.
Speaker 4: A lot of people want this PlayStation portal. My one
Speaker 4: piece of advice if you can't find it, there is
Speaker 4: something called the Backbone one controller and that's one hundred
Speaker 4: dollars less, so it's actually on sale for thirty dollars
Speaker 4: less on top of that, so you can get for
Speaker 4: about sixty nine seventy dollars out there, depending on which
Speaker 4: retail retailer you go with. But it turns your cell
Speaker 4: phone into almost like a PlayStation portal. So you know,
Speaker 4: if you can't get that number one gift, there are
Speaker 4: always alternatives out there. And that's my you know, big
Speaker 4: suggestion for people is you know there's there's something to
Speaker 4: you know, put under the tree or to to you know,
Speaker 4: a gift to give somebody, because there are a lot
Speaker 4: of options out there when it comes to technology that
Speaker 4: you know, even if you can't find that perfect gift,
Speaker 4: there's there's something out there to you know, fulfill that
Speaker 4: wish list.
Speaker 1: And what are you playing with this season? What's your
Speaker 1: what's your top pick for yourself?
Speaker 4: I'm really looking forward to diving into Spider Man two.
Speaker 4: That's the new PlayStation five video game that is really
Speaker 4: really popular. Uh it is it's free if you buy
Speaker 4: a PlayStation slim, so you're saving seventy dollars there. And uh,
Speaker 4: I got a new tcl Roku TV, so I'm looking
Speaker 4: forward to, you know, using that along with my PlayStation five.
Speaker 1: Two very popular items. Matt Swider of the shortcut dot Com,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining me today.
Speaker 5: Thanks.
Speaker 1: This is Allay rich I'll put a link to Matt's
Speaker 1: website on mine. Just go to rich on Tech dot
Speaker 1: tv to sign up to be a member of the
Speaker 1: shortcut dot com or get his free newsletter More rich
Speaker 1: on Tech coming your way.
Speaker 6: Right after this.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich on Tech. Triple eight rich one
Speaker 1: O one eight eight eight seven four to two four
Speaker 1: one zero one. Let's go to line one Feruza in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles. Did I say that right?
Speaker 7: Yes?
Speaker 8: You did?
Speaker 7: Great?
Speaker 5: How much for taking my call?
Speaker 1: Absolutely? What can I help you with today?
Speaker 7: I have an iPhone six and this holiday season I'm
Speaker 7: going to upgrade to an iPhone thirteen or fourteen. And
Speaker 7: I'm particularly interested in the double Eastern feature because I
Speaker 7: do travel internationally a fair bit and I just wanted
Speaker 7: to understand is it the same on both the thirteen
Speaker 7: and fourteen? And how does it work?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is the same feature they've been I think
Speaker 1: they've had this on the iPhone since the iPhone ten.
Speaker 1: They did it secretly for many years just to test
Speaker 1: it out, make sure it worked, and then they decided
Speaker 1: to say no more SIM cards with the last year's phone.
Speaker 1: So now there's no there's no physical SIM card slot
Speaker 1: inside the iPhone anymore. But the way the eSIM works,
Speaker 1: especially for travel, is that you would have your regular SIM,
Speaker 1: which is still an e SIM, but you can have
Speaker 1: multiple SIMS on your phone. You can have a bunch
Speaker 1: of them. I had I think like two or three
Speaker 1: on my phone at one time, and you can activate them,
Speaker 1: you can deactivate them, you can keep going on there
Speaker 1: for a long time and just activate it when you
Speaker 1: go to a different country. But the way you install
Speaker 1: it is you just you know, let's say you have
Speaker 1: one of your main carriers here, that's you know, Verizon,
Speaker 1: T Mobile, any you know, Mint Mobile, whatever it is.
Speaker 1: You've got your main SIM, and then you can add
Speaker 1: a secondary SIM, and that secondary SIM could be an
Speaker 1: international SIM, it could be even a secondary cellular line
Speaker 1: here in America. So let's say you wanted one SIM
Speaker 1: for your phone calls and one for your data, or
Speaker 1: even two for your data. You can set that up,
Speaker 1: so it's really unlimited what you can do. But the
Speaker 1: way it works overseas, in particular, what I do is
Speaker 1: I typically turn off my main SIM and then flip
Speaker 1: on the international SIM and then that way I can
Speaker 1: still use my data through the international SIM and not
Speaker 1: pay the roaming charges. And there's a lot of different
Speaker 1: ways to do this, but that's kind of generally how
Speaker 1: it works. If you're traveling internationally to a different country,
Speaker 1: you can pick up a local eSIM there, or you
Speaker 1: can use one of these companies that lets you activate
Speaker 1: an eSIM right from your phone. So the one I
Speaker 1: always talk about is airlow US Mobile also has one,
Speaker 1: but there are many many different companies that do this,
Speaker 1: And so if you just look up e SIM for
Speaker 1: the country you want to go to, you can do
Speaker 1: that and set it up very easily here in the
Speaker 1: States before you leave. But I think that it's a
Speaker 1: very simple system. The only place where it gets a
Speaker 1: little complicated is if you want to continue. Most of
Speaker 1: these eSIMs are data only, but that's also changing, so
Speaker 1: the eSIM that you get for overseas might just candle
Speaker 1: data and not calls. But that makes sense because you
Speaker 1: don't want to give someone a different phone number just
Speaker 1: when you're overseas. They just want to call your regular
Speaker 1: phone number. So in that case, I recommend that you
Speaker 1: turn on your Rome. You're not your roaming but your
Speaker 1: Wi Fi calling. Jony on Twitter at rich on Tech
Speaker 1: or x I should say, says, is there any way
Speaker 1: to take low resolution photos on the new iPhone? Those
Speaker 1: three point eight megapixel photos eat up storage and I
Speaker 1: don't always need the high res thanks rich on Tech. Well,
Speaker 1: the photos aren't three point eight megapixels. I think the
Speaker 1: storage space is three point eight And yes, on the
Speaker 1: new iPhone, the default megapixels is twenty four now, which
Speaker 1: is amazing because you're getting so much more data on
Speaker 1: your photos, which means you can zoom in, you can crop,
Speaker 1: you just have a lot more flexibility with the amount
Speaker 1: of data these photos carry because they are twenty four
Speaker 1: megapixels by default. If you don't want them to be
Speaker 1: twenty four megapixels, if you want to go back to twelve,
Speaker 1: you can. You go to settings, you go to camera,
Speaker 1: and you go to formats and then inside there it
Speaker 1: says photo capture photo mode twenty four megapixels. You tap
Speaker 1: there and you can tap twelve and you can take
Speaker 1: your twelve megapixel photos just like before. According to Apple,
Speaker 1: a twelve megapixel photo will be about two megabytes, a
Speaker 1: twenty four megapixel photo will be about three megabytes. But
Speaker 1: like you said, Jony, it's probably closer to about three
Speaker 1: point eight. Let me see on my phone here what
Speaker 1: my latest picture is. So if I just pick one
Speaker 1: of these photos here and uh, let's see this photo
Speaker 1: is oh five point eight mega five point eight megabytes. Wow,
Speaker 1: So Apple, Apple's really being conservative in their estimates. But
Speaker 1: again with today's storage on the phones, I would say
Speaker 1: take the bigger photos. But if you don't need to
Speaker 1: need that, just go ahead and you can change that
Speaker 1: in the settings. Let's go to Tatiana in Banning, California,
Speaker 1: Line one, Tatiana your own with Wretch.
Speaker 7: Hi.
Speaker 9: Well, I was calling about herb about YouTube. You know,
Speaker 9: I wonder if you know if you could help me.
Speaker 9: I have a prime membership with YouTube and it's worth fine.
Speaker 9: Until last week and the last few days I keep
Speaker 9: receiving all those you know, notification that I have end blockers.
Speaker 9: I have either to unblock or to switch to Prime
Speaker 9: membership and I already have Prime membership and I keep
Speaker 9: telling them sort of, and they said, report the issue
Speaker 9: if it's not correct, and I keep reporting that, Hello,
Speaker 9: I am a pro, I have Prime membership, and you
Speaker 9: keep blocking me because sometimes they block block and yesterday
Speaker 9: I was not able to watch YouTube at all. And
Speaker 9: not that I you know, but the point is that
Speaker 9: why should I? You know, I have my Prime membership
Speaker 9: and the worst thing is to reach anybody on YouTube
Speaker 9: by a phone is not possible. They offer you chat,
Speaker 9: and the chat, you know, I tell him, Okay, I
Speaker 9: have Prime membership. Why you are you want me to
Speaker 9: switch to Prime if I already have fun and you
Speaker 9: are blocking me? And she says you have to remove
Speaker 9: ad blocks, but okay, I show them up.
Speaker 10: You know.
Speaker 9: That's what you understand.
Speaker 1: Okay, teams. So a couple of things happening here. So
Speaker 1: number one, you're referring to YouTube Prime membership. So Amazon
Speaker 1: offers a Prime membership. So if you have an Amazon
Speaker 1: Prime membership, that does not give you access to YouTube,
Speaker 1: you know, without a So that's number one. So it
Speaker 1: is a separate membership. So if you are talking about YouTube,
Speaker 1: what it's called is YouTube Premium When it first was
Speaker 1: introduced a couple of years ago, it was called YouTube Read.
Speaker 1: They have changed the name to YouTube Premium. And the
Speaker 1: way that you can check if you have YouTube Premium,
Speaker 1: if you are paying, I believe I pay twenty two
Speaker 1: to ninety nine a month. I don't know how much.
Speaker 1: I think it's fifteen ninety nine a month for the
Speaker 1: standard I've got the family plan. But let's see the
Speaker 1: standard plan individuals. Yeah, thirteen ninety nine a month. Family
Speaker 1: is twenty two ninety nine a month. So you can
Speaker 1: check to see if you are on a YouTube Premium
Speaker 1: plan which gives you YouTube and YouTube music ad free
Speaker 1: offline and in the background. You can go to YouTube
Speaker 1: dot com slash premium and when I go to that page,
Speaker 1: it says you have YouTube Premium managed. So that's the
Speaker 1: first thing, Tatiana. If you don't see that when you
Speaker 1: go to that website, you don't have YouTube Premium. Now.
Speaker 1: The second way to check is to go to YouTube
Speaker 1: dot com and in the left hand corner, in the
Speaker 1: upper left corner, your YouTube icon changes from YouTube to
Speaker 1: a little icon of the YouTube screen and it says premium.
Speaker 1: So that's number one. We just need to make sure
Speaker 1: that you're actually referring to what you have. If you
Speaker 1: have Amazon Prime, that does not give you access to
Speaker 1: YouTube Premium. Now the second part of what you're talking about,
Speaker 1: the ad blocker. YouTube has been cracking down on people
Speaker 1: using ad blockers to get rid of ads on YouTube.
Speaker 1: Why because YouTube and Google make a whole lot of
Speaker 1: money on serving up ads during YouTube videos, and in
Speaker 1: the past people were able to get around some of
Speaker 1: those ads by putting an ad blocker on on their computer. Well,
Speaker 1: YouTube does not like that, so they are cracking down,
Speaker 1: not on everyone, not in every instance, not on every time,
Speaker 1: but they are cracking down on some of the use
Speaker 1: of ad blockers on YouTube. So if you do have
Speaker 1: an ad blocker on your system and you're trying to
Speaker 1: access YouTube, you will have to pause that ad blocker,
Speaker 1: and you can do that by tapping your ad blocker,
Speaker 1: and usually you can you can what's called allow list
Speaker 1: the website, so you can say, do not use this
Speaker 1: ad blocker on the YouTube dot com website because it
Speaker 1: will not function properly. And in general, if you're using
Speaker 1: an ad blocker on your computer, you can disable that
Speaker 1: for a website. If a website you visit is not
Speaker 1: working or it feels a little wonky, then it's probably
Speaker 1: your AD blocker that is interfering. Thanks for the call today, Tatiana.
Speaker 1: You are listening to Rich on Tech. Give me a call.
Speaker 1: It's triple a Richt to Welcome back to rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: Rich DeMuro here hanging out with you, talking technology. This
Speaker 1: is the show where I talk about the tech stuff
Speaker 1: that I think you should know about. It's also the
Speaker 1: place where I answer your questions. And that's exactly what
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do. Right now. You can go to the
Speaker 1: website rich on Tech dot tv, hit the link that
Speaker 1: says contact and send me your question. And that's exactly
Speaker 1: what Sierra did. Sierra says, Hey, Rich love your tech shows.
Speaker 1: I listen to you every week for important tech updates.
Speaker 1: My question is what browser do you prefer? Chrome, Safari, Firefox,
Speaker 1: et cetera. And why. Thanks for all that you do. Well,
Speaker 1: I will tell you that Chrome is my preferred web
Speaker 1: browser and that is because of several reasons. Number one,
Speaker 1: I like how it integrates with Google products. I like
Speaker 1: the extensions that you can get for it. And it
Speaker 1: was very slow for a while. I think that Google
Speaker 1: was very aware of that, especially on the Mac side
Speaker 1: of things, it consumed a lot of resources. It still
Speaker 1: kind of does, but I think it has gotten better,
Speaker 1: maybe through a combination of some software updates and a
Speaker 1: better computer that I have. But I like Chrome because
Speaker 1: it's what I'm used to and it's what works for me.
Speaker 1: I also like, like I said, the extensions that are
Speaker 1: available for it. I personally would recommend that you block
Speaker 1: your third party cookies if you are using Chrome. That way,
Speaker 1: your browsing history is not passed along to different websites,
Speaker 1: or at least it's a little more private as far
Speaker 1: as I can tell.
Speaker 10: Now.
Speaker 1: When it comes to Mozilla Firefox, I think there's more
Speaker 1: privacy out of the gate, like I think the settings
Speaker 1: are made in a way that protects user privacy just
Speaker 1: a little bit more than Chrome. However, not as popular
Speaker 1: as Chrome. I mean, Chrome is really the number one
Speaker 1: browser with a very large market share. And then when
Speaker 1: it comes to Safari, I think that the market share
Speaker 1: is really tiny.
Speaker 8: There.
Speaker 1: On iPhone, it's huge because that is the default browser.
Speaker 1: But on the MacBook computers and especially the Windows computers,
Speaker 1: people use either Chrome or a Microsoft product. So Safari
Speaker 1: is really fast. It's just not my preferred web browser now.
Speaker 1: The other one that I really do like is called
Speaker 1: Microsoft Edge and it is very similar to Chrome in
Speaker 1: many ways. The only thing I don't like about it
Speaker 1: is how they force a lot of Microsoft products on me.
Speaker 1: But it's funny because Chrome pretty much does the same thing.
Speaker 1: But since I use more Google products, it doesn't bother
Speaker 1: me as much. So the browser that you want to use,
Speaker 1: I think really comes down to personal preference, and any
Speaker 1: of them are good. I think that the main thing
Speaker 1: to know is just be aware of the privacy setting
Speaker 1: and tweak those so that you are protecting your privacy
Speaker 1: as you browse the web. Thanks for the question, Sierra.
Speaker 1: Up next is Ed. Ed says, great show as usual.
Speaker 1: My question is on my Gmail app on iPad, when
Speaker 1: I swipe left, it goes to archive. I want to
Speaker 1: swipe left to delete. Please help me with that. Also,
Speaker 1: how do I access my archive to get rid of
Speaker 1: those archived files? Well, first off, Ed, you can easily
Speaker 1: switch this. In fact, this is one of the first
Speaker 1: things I do anytime I set up a new phone.
Speaker 1: By default, Gmail has certain swipes that I don't like,
Speaker 1: so I like to swipe right to delete in my
Speaker 1: Gmail and I like to swipe left to archive because
Speaker 1: it just seems right to me. If I swipe right,
Speaker 1: I'm trashing something. If I'm swiping left, I'm archiving it,
Speaker 1: and that means I'm saving it for later. So to
Speaker 1: do this, you open up your Gmail app on your
Speaker 1: iPad or on your phone. You tap the menu, which
Speaker 1: are the three lines in the upper left hand corner.
Speaker 1: Then you scroll to settings and that's all the way down,
Speaker 1: and then you go to inbox customizations. Now this is
Speaker 1: a little bit different on Android versus iOS, but it's
Speaker 1: very similar and you can do both the same things.
Speaker 1: Tap inbox customizations and you will see mail swipe actions
Speaker 1: and it says swipe right, swipe left, and you can
Speaker 1: decide what those do. Now, for your second question, how
Speaker 1: do I see all those archived files? Go back into
Speaker 1: that original menu that I mentioned, and you will see
Speaker 1: an item or a label I should say that says
Speaker 1: all mail. All mail is all of your mail. So
Speaker 1: when you archive something in Gmail, you're actually just marking
Speaker 1: it with a label that does not keep it in
Speaker 1: the main inbox. Because the way that Gmail works, just
Speaker 1: think of it as one ongoing list of all of
Speaker 1: your messages. Some of them are visible, some are not.
Speaker 1: Great question there, let's go to the next question. Ron says, Hey, Rich,
Speaker 1: I'm wondering how my wife has been spying on my
Speaker 1: text messages. I've found some of them printed out on paper.
Speaker 1: I've also seen she's printed out messages from someone else's phone. Also,
Speaker 1: how is she able to do this from her phone?
Speaker 1: Thanks for your help, well, Ron, barring any conspiracy theory
Speaker 1: or magical powers that your wife has, I think that
Speaker 1: you are logged in using the same iCloud account, and
Speaker 1: a lot of times families do this on their phones
Speaker 1: where they have one log in to make things easy,
Speaker 1: but then the text messages and the settings carry over
Speaker 1: to all the different devices. So I'm assuming that your
Speaker 1: wife somehow has access to your text messages based on
Speaker 1: the same iCloud account and the other person's phone. I'm
Speaker 1: guessing that's another family member. So if you don't want
Speaker 1: this to happen, then I would create your own unique
Speaker 1: iCloud account. You could still be on a family account
Speaker 1: and still share a lot of the resources on your iCloud,
Speaker 1: but if you want your own private iCloud account, you
Speaker 1: do need to log in and create your own account.
Speaker 1: Next up, Data says, when I go to Disneyland, my
Speaker 1: iPhone fourteen pro dies after sending photos, et cetera. What
Speaker 1: is the strongest charger, phone bank or what else would
Speaker 1: work best? Thank you and happy holidays. Great question, Data.
Speaker 1: I always bring a portable battery with me when I
Speaker 1: go to a place like Disneyland. And here's the reason
Speaker 1: why it's dying so quickly. It's because you're using your
Speaker 1: phone more and a combination of the cellular signal and
Speaker 1: the videos you're taking, all of these things are adding
Speaker 1: up to just really tax the battery on your phone.
Speaker 1: So you're taking more pictures, you're taking more videos, and
Speaker 1: if your phone is set to back up those pictures
Speaker 1: and videos, that is using a lot of charge from
Speaker 1: your battery. Couple of recommendations. There are three types of
Speaker 1: chargers you can get. One is a mag safe, one
Speaker 1: is a plug, and one is a sort of a
Speaker 1: portable battery pack that has a built in connector. So
Speaker 1: for the recommendations here, I like the Anchor nano power
Speaker 1: bank with a built in connector. That's a small battery
Speaker 1: though it's only five thousand millionamp hours. That's basically going
Speaker 1: to give you about one charge but the nice thing
Speaker 1: is it's small and it plugs right into the bottom
Speaker 1: of your phone. Second one is an anchor power bank
Speaker 1: twenty thousand millionamp portable charger, and this you can use
Speaker 1: with USBC. Make sure you find one that has USB
Speaker 1: C in and out. That's going to give you the
Speaker 1: fastest charge both ways, and you will need to bring
Speaker 1: your own cable with this style portable charger. And then
Speaker 1: finally you have a BLKAN wireless power bank with MagSafe.
Speaker 1: This is going to magnetically attached to the back of
Speaker 1: your phone and charge it that way. I don't know
Speaker 1: what the millionamp hours is on this, but it's pretty low.
Speaker 1: But you can get them in different levels. You know,
Speaker 1: depending on how thick it is, it's going to give
Speaker 1: you a bigger charge. The downside to the mag safe
Speaker 1: is that it's going to be the slowest charge out
Speaker 1: of all of these different methods. But definitely get one
Speaker 1: of these, get them while they're on sale over the
Speaker 1: Black Friday Cyber Monday shopping season, and just always keep
Speaker 1: it charged up and with you. Sharon writes in can
Speaker 1: you recommend a photostick flash drive? Thank you? Lots of
Speaker 1: questions about pictures people love to take them, so I
Speaker 1: get this question over and over and over. And while
Speaker 1: I don't necessarily love a flash drive for backing up
Speaker 1: my photos, it is an alternative to just backing up
Speaker 1: to the cloud. Personally, I think you should have your
Speaker 1: photos in the cloud and in a secondary place as well,
Speaker 1: in addition to your phone. So what does that mean.
Speaker 1: You can use something like iCloud and also Amazon Photos.
Speaker 1: If you're a Prime member, you can get unlimited backup there,
Speaker 1: but you also want to have your photos in two
Speaker 1: places at once in addition to your phone, so one
Speaker 1: of these flash drives can work as well. I don't
Speaker 1: think it'd be best to have them only on a
Speaker 1: flash drive. But the brand I like, sand Disc I Expand.
Speaker 1: So the I Expand has various models Summer Lightning, some
Speaker 1: are USBC depending on the phoney have you plug it
Speaker 1: into the bottom of your phone. It brings up the
Speaker 1: app and you can do a complete backup of your
Speaker 1: photos and videos, So make sure you get the one
Speaker 1: that's right for your phone. Pn Y also makes a
Speaker 1: model that is similar. I think that the software that
Speaker 1: sand Disc has is just slightly better. It works a
Speaker 1: little bit better for me in my testing. All right,
Speaker 1: coming up next, we've got more of your calls at
Speaker 1: triple eight Rich one oh one. That's eighty eight seven
Speaker 1: four to two, four to one zero one. My name
Speaker 1: is Rich d'miro and you are listening to rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich Demiro here talking
Speaker 1: technology with you at triple eight rich one oh one.
Speaker 1: That's eight eight eight seven four to two four one
Speaker 1: zero one. Free call from anywhere inside the US. Marvin
Speaker 1: in Denver, Colorado. Marvin, you're on with Rich Hi.
Speaker 10: Rich, How you doing.
Speaker 1: I'm doing fantastic. How are you good?
Speaker 8: Say?
Speaker 10: I'm trying to get some information on a guest you
Speaker 10: head on some time ago who had developed a computer
Speaker 10: program for baseball cards, another sports member of Bilia. This
Speaker 10: has been about a year ago. But I didn't catch
Speaker 10: his phone number. I think his name might have been
Speaker 10: Ted Mann, but I'm not positive of that. Yeah, good
Speaker 10: memory out how to get in touch with that guest?
Speaker 1: Absolutely, Okay, So the good question, and thanks for calling.
Speaker 1: But so I looked on the website if you go
Speaker 1: to rich on Tech dot tv, that's where you can
Speaker 1: typically find anything that I mentioned on the show. And
Speaker 1: so I will tell you I typed in baseball to
Speaker 1: find obviously you know baseball card scanning, and nothing came up.
Speaker 1: So you are absolutely right, Marvin, you had one part
Speaker 1: of the equation. But here's what happened. So the notes
Speaker 1: are on there. And the app, by the way, is
Speaker 1: called collect c l l X. This was invented by
Speaker 1: a New Jersey dad and his son. You're right. His
Speaker 1: name is Ted Man. We did a segment with him
Speaker 1: both on tea and on the radio.
Speaker 7: Here.
Speaker 1: It's a really cool app that helps you scan your
Speaker 1: cards and figure out what the value of them is
Speaker 1: in seconds. So the app uses instant image recognition to
Speaker 1: recognize the card and provides its current market value. You
Speaker 1: can build and track your entire collection. One of my
Speaker 1: friends kept texting me after I'd talked about this app.
Speaker 1: I think it was up to like a couple thousand
Speaker 1: bucks worth of cards on the app. And of course
Speaker 1: you can use the app to connect with other collectors, buy, sell,
Speaker 1: and trade cards, and there's a whole bunch of stuff.
Speaker 1: This thing has just taken on a life of its own.
Speaker 1: I think they added some new AI features as well.
Speaker 1: But again, the app is called Collex co l l
Speaker 1: X dot app and Tedman is on there. He's the founder,
Speaker 1: like you said, and you can email him through the
Speaker 1: website as well. But the reason why you couldn't find
Speaker 1: it on my website is because baseball was not in
Speaker 1: the description. I wrote it down as it says Tedman,
Speaker 1: creator of the Collex app which lets you scan your
Speaker 1: sports card collection. So I should have said I should
Speaker 1: have said, I mean including baseball cards because I figured.
Speaker 1: And by the way, that show was on February eleventh,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. That was the sixth episode of the
Speaker 1: radio show. So good memory, thanks for calling, appreciate that,
Speaker 1: and good luck scanning your cards. Let's go to Melody
Speaker 1: in Carlsbad. Melody You're on with Rich.
Speaker 8: Hi Rich listen.
Speaker 11: About probably nine months ago, I received a notice from
Speaker 11: the post office that I had a registered letter. I
Speaker 11: went there and the registered letter was from Geek Squad telling.
Speaker 2: Me that I needed to renew my account.
Speaker 11: Well, I saw that was really odd that they anybody
Speaker 11: would be sending me a registered letter. I thought it
Speaker 11: was a scam. I checked it out, and of course
Speaker 11: it was a scam, so I did nothing with it.
Speaker 11: Then about a month ago I got an email from
Speaker 11: the Geek Squad saying I needed alerting me that my
Speaker 11: account was going to expire and I needed to renew it. Well,
Speaker 11: I ignored that because I knew the Geek Squad that
Speaker 11: it was a scam. I don't have an account with
Speaker 11: geek Squad. I've never done any business with geek Squad,
Speaker 11: So then I ignored the email. A few days ago,
Speaker 11: I get an email from an unknown person advising me
Speaker 11: that my account has been restored or renewed and for
Speaker 11: a charge of I think it was like two hundred
Speaker 11: bucks one nine. Well, I I didn't do anything, you know,
Speaker 11: I have taken any action on that.
Speaker 2: But I'm wondering what do I do?
Speaker 11: Yeah, the only thing I can think of is to
Speaker 11: keep monitoring my credit card accounts. But I can't, you know,
Speaker 11: unless they have I don't know if they have any
Speaker 11: of my credit card information.
Speaker 1: Okay, this is I'm glad you brought this up, Melody,
Speaker 1: because this is happening a lot, a lot, a lot,
Speaker 1: and it is I'm seeing two of the major scams
Speaker 1: out there. One involves a Geek Squad, the other involves
Speaker 1: Norton Anti virus, And so it happens exactly like you're
Speaker 1: saying you get an email that says, here's an invoice
Speaker 1: for your geek Squad service renewal and it's some ungodly amount,
Speaker 1: you know, three hundred ninety eight dollars for the year,
Speaker 1: two hundred ninety eight dollars, whatever it is, and it
Speaker 1: says this will be charged, you know, in the next
Speaker 1: week unless you call this number. And so we call
Speaker 1: this number. I'm actually looking at one right now. Okay.
Speaker 1: It says geek Squad protect your tech, It's time for
Speaker 1: renewal order ID product, geek Squad five year personal home
Speaker 1: membership customer information. It has all your data on there,
Speaker 1: including your name and your email address, and it says
Speaker 1: we're ready to help whenever you need us, call us
Speaker 1: at this phone number. And so what's happening is they
Speaker 1: want you to see this email and say, wait a second,
Speaker 1: I didn't subscribe to geek Squad, and you call that number,
Speaker 1: and that's when the actual scam takes place, because you
Speaker 1: think that you're confirming your credit card number or getting
Speaker 1: this charge reversed, and they're actually collecting that information from you.
Speaker 1: This has nothing to do with the geek Squad. They're
Speaker 1: just using the geek Squad's good name to get your
Speaker 1: information and to try to charge you. So, Melody, I
Speaker 1: know this is happening to you, and you're getting these
Speaker 1: letters in the mail and these emails, and you know
Speaker 1: could even be a phone call. But the best thing
Speaker 1: you can do is, like you said, monitor your credit
Speaker 1: card for any real charges that may come about, which
Speaker 1: there's probably not going to be any, and just keep
Speaker 1: deleting these emails, don't don't unsubscribe to them, don't call
Speaker 1: the phone number that's inside these emails. This is something
Speaker 1: that I'm seeing on a daily basis. I'm getting these
Speaker 1: emails and so it's coming. Like I said, the Geek
Speaker 1: Squad and Norton are two of the biggest because those
Speaker 1: are two of the biggest brand names out there. So
Speaker 1: that's what's happening, Melody, you could safely ignore them. I'm
Speaker 1: glad you brought it up so that people can't avoid this.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for the call today. Triple eight Rich
Speaker 1: one O one eight eight eight seven four to two
Speaker 1: four one zero one. Mark is in one NETCA, California.
Speaker 2: Mark you're on with Rich Well, good definite answer. I
Speaker 2: generally speaking, I'm always researching and looking at different things,
Speaker 2: and I may go to a website I don't have
Speaker 2: time to look at at that point of time. Sure,
Speaker 2: so I'll drag down one of the euros to the desktop.
Speaker 2: I have so many things on my desktop here, but
Speaker 2: I pulled down a couple of articles or stories from
Speaker 2: Quitter months ago, and I pulled it down to the
Speaker 2: desktop so I could go back to it later. And
Speaker 2: now I can't get rid of them. They won't delete.
Speaker 2: They won't even move off of the position that they're in.
Speaker 2: I might be able to move around a little bit,
Speaker 2: but it will not delete. It will not allow me
Speaker 2: to watch it and then get rid of it. And
Speaker 2: it's bad enough with YouTube not let me on talking
Speaker 2: about malware bites. They won't even allow mailware bites. So
Speaker 2: I'm kind of at a what kind of computer is
Speaker 2: this laptop? That's you know, Windows?
Speaker 1: Okay, so Windows, So on a Windows computer, the best
Speaker 1: way to delete these things, obviously, you can drag them
Speaker 1: to the trash can. If it's a you know, if
Speaker 1: it's a quick shortcut to a URL or any icon
Speaker 1: that's on your desktop. The main ways to delete these
Speaker 1: things are to drag them to the trash so you
Speaker 1: can just pick one up and drag it to the
Speaker 1: trash and of course I assume you've tried to do that,
Speaker 1: because you're saying that this is not working. So the
Speaker 1: second way to try to get rid of these URLs
Speaker 1: on your desktop is to select one and then press
Speaker 1: shift and the delete key at the same time. So
Speaker 1: shift and delete to get rid of this. And it
Speaker 1: says I'm trying this right now. It says, are you
Speaker 1: sure you want to permanently delete this item? I press yes,
Speaker 1: and my computer is saying access denied. And so this
Speaker 1: may be what you're coming up against. You may need
Speaker 1: to log in as an administrator to do this because
Speaker 1: sometimes it does try to protect you from certain operations
Speaker 1: on your computer that could have negative effects. Welcome back
Speaker 1: to Rich on Tech. Rich Demiro here hanging out with you,
Speaker 1: talking technology. Welcoming back to the show. Jen Calltrider with
Speaker 1: the Mozilla Foundation, lead researcher at Privacy Not Included. Jen,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining me again.
Speaker 5: Yeah, thanks for having me back.
Speaker 1: So you've got a new report out a nightmare before Christmas.
Speaker 1: Mozilla researchers find many popular tech gifts perform worse on
Speaker 1: privacy than ever before. Explain to me what the Privacy
Speaker 1: Not Included Guide is all about.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we review the privacy and security out of all
Speaker 5: those fun connected gadgets that you're shopping for at the holidays.
Speaker 5: We've been doing that since twenty seventeen, and we try
Speaker 5: and help people with our fun reviews at Privacy Not
Speaker 5: Included dot Org know which smart watch is better at
Speaker 5: protecting your privacy than another, which smart speaker, which fitness
Speaker 5: equipment or or that the like of the like. So
Speaker 5: just you know, we try and make help you smart
Speaker 5: shops smart for connected devices.
Speaker 1: What are some specific examples of popular tech gifts that
Speaker 1: have not done so well on your Buyer's Guide this year?
Speaker 5: Oh gosh, Amazon products, they just keep disappointing us. You know,
Speaker 5: the Amazon has a bunch of products. They're smart speakers,
Speaker 5: they're tablets for kids, their kindles, things like that, and
Speaker 5: you know, Amazon just they're track record just keeps getting
Speaker 5: worse and worse at protecting privacy. They collect a ton
Speaker 5: of data, they use that data to make money, and
Speaker 5: they just keep getting in trouble with the FTC and
Speaker 5: the like for not respecting our privacy with all that
Speaker 5: data they collect. So they're they're pretty bad. We saw
Speaker 5: Xbox this year gets our privacy not included ding. They
Speaker 5: got fined big by the FTC this year because they
Speaker 5: violated the children's privacy laws and that's that's not good.
Speaker 5: And then we see, you know, the standards, the usuals
Speaker 5: that that that aren't great. You've got some kids toys
Speaker 5: on there that raise eyebrows. Smart watches for kids are
Speaker 5: something that we especially looked at and have some concerns with. Yeah,
Speaker 5: so lots of products that raise eyebrows, but there are
Speaker 5: a few good ones.
Speaker 1: Okay, before we get to the good ones, I'm just
Speaker 1: curious because I'm hearing a lot more about connected children's
Speaker 1: toys and the personal data that they collect. What is
Speaker 1: the implication of this, Like, you know, these things have
Speaker 1: microphones on them and speakers and internet connections and cameras.
Speaker 1: What does that all mean for kids and parents?
Speaker 5: It means that parents need to really pay attention when
Speaker 5: they buy their kids a connected toy or a connected
Speaker 5: smartwatch or any connected device. It's no fun to read
Speaker 5: privacy policies. I can say that because I do it
Speaker 5: for a living, and I don't wish it on anybody,
Speaker 5: because they're confusing. There's a million of them. Out there.
Speaker 5: It's really hard to understand, Okay, what data is being
Speaker 5: collected on me as a parent through the app that
Speaker 5: I have to download the control device, versus what data
Speaker 5: is being collected on my kid. You know, did I
Speaker 5: consent to have that data being used for personalization or advertising?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 5: How do I delete it if I want to? And
Speaker 5: so those are all big concerns that it makes it
Speaker 5: difficult for parents to really kind of understand and know
Speaker 5: what's best. And then there's some really creepy products that
Speaker 5: we came across this year. I mentioned smart watches for kids.
Speaker 5: We came across two different smart watches for kids. One
Speaker 5: just flat out didn't have a privacy policy for the
Speaker 5: device the app that the collects your GPS location as cameras, microphones, sensors,
Speaker 5: and the other one had a barely a privacy policy
Speaker 5: that super vague buried in the terms and conditions. And
Speaker 5: you know, a privy policy is what a company uses
Speaker 5: to say how they're going to collect your data, how
Speaker 5: they're going to use it, what controls you have over it.
Speaker 5: And the fact that we're finding devices that are so
Speaker 5: invasive they're basically surveillance devices that don't have privacy policies
Speaker 5: at all, shows that these companies are sketchy at best
Speaker 5: and potentially really dangerous at worst.
Speaker 1: How does a parent know if something is going to
Speaker 1: have a bad rap? They just look at your website.
Speaker 5: We try and help. That's a good place to start.
Speaker 5: It is hard to know. I mean, I think asking
Speaker 5: yourself as a parent, you know what level of data
Speaker 5: collection am I okay with on my child? You know,
Speaker 5: the Moxie robot that we review doesn't actually earn our
Speaker 5: privacy not included warning label, but we were very close.
Speaker 5: We were very on the fence about giving it that
Speaker 5: because their privacy policy sounds okay, but at the same time,
Speaker 5: they're sharing so incredibly much data. There's video, there's cameras.
Speaker 5: It's marketed as a toy for your kids to help
Speaker 5: them learn emotional intelligence and build relationships. But buried in
Speaker 5: the privacy policy they say, oh, teach your kids never
Speaker 5: to share personal information, and those things seem contradictory. And
Speaker 5: so that's the kind of stuff that we see that
Speaker 5: we would like parents to be wario. You know, there's
Speaker 5: some good products out there, you know, the Tamagatchi Uni
Speaker 5: or the Doggie that are still kind of fun interactive toys.
Speaker 5: There's some coding kids that are fun interactive toys that
Speaker 5: just don't collect a lot of personal information. And that's
Speaker 5: the way I would go if I were a parent.
Speaker 1: And they had some previously top or positively rated companies
Speaker 1: like Sono's and Bows and Ufi, but this year they
Speaker 1: didn't do so well. So what changed?
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's interesting to see companies just getting more and
Speaker 5: more into the game of collecting data and then trying
Speaker 5: to make money off of it, you know, both is
Speaker 5: an interesting one. You know, Boss makes headphones, that's what
Speaker 5: they do. They make headphones and speakers, and you know,
Speaker 5: reading through Boss privacy policy this year, we found the
Speaker 5: line in there that says that they can collect data
Speaker 5: on your head movements based on your your headphones. You're like,
Speaker 5: why does those need to collect that data? But then
Speaker 5: they go on and say that they could possibly sell
Speaker 5: that data linked to potentially your email, and again it's like,
Speaker 5: why do my headphones need to do that? They didn't
Speaker 5: do that a few years ago, and now they're doing that,
Speaker 5: And that's just kind of the slow creep of more technology,
Speaker 5: more sensors, more data being collected from all our connected stuff,
Speaker 5: even our headphones, and then it's how can we make
Speaker 5: money off that? How can we you know, sell that
Speaker 5: or share that for advertising or more. And so that's
Speaker 5: what worries is we're seeing more and more of that
Speaker 5: from companies that used to actually be pretty good. The
Speaker 5: other thing that we're seeing that that's worrisome is some
Speaker 5: of the good guys fit Bit and i Robot. I
Speaker 5: Robot's been one of the best companies we've reviewed for
Speaker 5: privacy for a long time. They were on our best
Speaker 5: ult list. They're in the process of being bought by Amazon,
Speaker 5: and so you have a company that's good at privacy
Speaker 5: being bought by a company that's not good at privacy.
Speaker 5: And your data is a business asset that will transfer,
Speaker 5: and so that's a concern that got bought up by
Speaker 5: Google a couple of years ago, and you're seeing that
Speaker 5: marriage get closer and closer where you know now you'll
Speaker 5: need a Google account to sign up for a new
Speaker 5: fit that income, and you know that means your data
Speaker 5: is going to start going to Google, and Google likes data.
Speaker 1: So what steps are you taking to ensure that consumers
Speaker 1: are protected raise awareness about all of this.
Speaker 5: Well, I'm talking to you, Rich, I'm relying on people
Speaker 5: like you to try and help get the word out
Speaker 5: because people know you, they trust you, and you know,
Speaker 5: I just sit here and do the research and I
Speaker 5: rely on people like you, and I'm grateful for people
Speaker 5: like you to help get the word out because it
Speaker 5: is hard, you know. Like I said, I don't expect
Speaker 5: parents to read privacy policies. They're incomprehensible. But I do
Speaker 5: like the ceepeople ask questions and say, oh, I've heard
Speaker 5: bad things. Maybe I'll just take a peek at this
Speaker 5: privacy policy. They aren't completely horrible. You can determine what
Speaker 5: data is being collected. You can do a search for
Speaker 5: the word sell and see if your data is going
Speaker 5: to be sold. Things like that. But really, I just
Speaker 5: think sitting down and having a risk asseetment prossessment. I
Speaker 5: have good products, you know, I have an Amazon Kindle.
Speaker 5: You know, I'll bash Amazon for being bad at privacy,
Speaker 5: which they are, But do I really care if Amazon
Speaker 5: knows what books I read? I can live with that.
Speaker 1: This really all comes down to money. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: really what it comes down to. Work exchanging our data
Speaker 1: for product, and they are exchanging the data that we
Speaker 1: give them for some sort of sale, whether you know,
Speaker 1: even with Amazon your books, they want to recommend you
Speaker 1: other books that you might purchase from them. In the
Speaker 1: case of some of these things, it's a little more nuanced,
Speaker 1: like the head tracking stuff. Why but it's probably to
Speaker 1: develop better products that they can then make money off of.
Speaker 1: So does it really all just come down to money?
Speaker 5: It comes down to money. I mean, at the end
Speaker 5: of the day. What doesn't come down to money?
Speaker 10: Though? Right? Uh?
Speaker 5: But I also think you know, we're not The question
Speaker 5: of consent is when I think a lot about is
Speaker 5: a privacy researcher, and a lot of companies will say
Speaker 5: we'll never open do this without your data, we'll never
Speaker 5: share it, we'll not set up, never do anything with
Speaker 5: it without your consent. But then you ask, point, when
Speaker 5: did I consent to this? And that gets very nerky,
Speaker 5: and so yes, it all comes down to money, and
Speaker 5: what people should really be asking is do I consent
Speaker 5: to this? When did I consent to this? And how
Speaker 5: do I revoke my consent to this? Can I get
Speaker 5: my data deleted? Because they're going to keep doing it,
Speaker 5: that's not going to change, And unfortunately the onus is
Speaker 5: on us to protect ourselves. So it should be we
Speaker 5: need stronger federal privacy laws. We don't have federal privacy
Speaker 5: laws here in the country. I mean, we have child
Speaker 5: one and a healthcare and we don't have a consumer
Speaker 5: and we need that and people should start demanding.
Speaker 1: Ten call triter. Thanks so much for joining me. What's
Speaker 1: the website to go to?
Speaker 5: It's privacy.
Speaker 1: All right, take that list and check it twice. Thanks
Speaker 1: so much for joining me today. More rich on Tech
Speaker 1: coming your way right after this. What's going on? Welcome
Speaker 1: back to rich On Tech. Rich Demiro here hanging out
Speaker 1: with you talking technology. Hope you're having a fantastic day.
Speaker 1: Phone lines are open at triple eight rich one oh
Speaker 1: one eight eight eight seven four to two four one
Speaker 1: zero one is the phone number. It's a fun new game,
Speaker 1: Super Mario Brothers Wonder So let me tell you about
Speaker 1: this Nintendo game. This is the first two D side
Speaker 1: scrolling Mario Brothers game in over ten years. This launched
Speaker 1: for the Nintendo Switch. Mentioned it on the show last weekend,
Speaker 1: but I hadn't had a chance to play it just yet,
Speaker 1: and boy, when I got a chance to play it,
Speaker 1: it was fun. My nine year old and I were
Speaker 1: fighting over who got to play it next, because it
Speaker 1: was just It's one of those games that you just
Speaker 1: pick up and there's almost no learning curve, right, you
Speaker 1: just know how to play instinctive. So if you played
Speaker 1: the original Mario Brothers, or if you're looking for a
Speaker 1: gift this holiday season, or no matter what you're celebrating,
Speaker 1: people are going to be getting this as a gift.
Speaker 1: The kids are going to start playing it, and the
Speaker 1: parents or the adults are going to, wait a second,
Speaker 1: I want to play that because it just looks fun
Speaker 1: and it looks easy. I don't know if you've tried
Speaker 1: to play one of these video games these days, but
Speaker 1: you know there's like fifteen different controller settings, fifteen different
Speaker 1: buttons on that thing. And it's not for the faint
Speaker 1: of heart. Like you need to know how to play
Speaker 1: video games for most of today's games, this one you
Speaker 1: do not. It's got fun power ups like elephant fruit,
Speaker 1: which turns Mario into an elephant with like a horn
Speaker 1: or what do they call it, not a horn, elephant nose,
Speaker 1: like a long elephant nose, a trunk, Thank you, Bobo.
Speaker 1: Then they've got these wonder flowers that trigger effects. Now
Speaker 1: I don't know what these designers over in Japan. We're
Speaker 1: enjoying while they made this game. But those wonderflowers are
Speaker 1: a little you know. I guess all video games are
Speaker 1: kind of weird like that, right. There's up to four
Speaker 1: players locally and twelve players online, so that's kind of fun.
Speaker 1: The game is sixty dollars and this is gosh. It's
Speaker 1: been thirty years since the launch of the original Super
Speaker 1: Mario Brothers game on nes want to date yourself, There
Speaker 1: you go, thirty years. So again, Super Mario Brothers. Wonder.
Speaker 1: If you're looking for a gift this holiday season, I'm
Speaker 1: telling you this is the one to get. Kids will
Speaker 1: love it, adults will love it, and I think you're
Speaker 1: gonna have fun playing this game, so I am, that's
Speaker 1: for sure. Mike wrote in on the website. I have
Speaker 1: a set of bows Q forty five quiet comfort noise
Speaker 1: canceling headphones. I'm having connectivity issues with my Samsung S
Speaker 1: ten smartphone. I'm trying to connect with Bluetooth. Sometimes it works,
Speaker 1: sometimes it does not. On my phone. All my echo
Speaker 1: dots show up in the list, even my TV, but
Speaker 1: not my headphones. Last night it played somehow, even though
Speaker 1: it never came up in the list. Out of curiosity,
Speaker 1: I closed all the apps and it was still playing
Speaker 1: help me please in bold letters, Mike, I think you
Speaker 1: need to do what's called a network settings reset on
Speaker 1: this Samsung Galaxy S ten smartphone. It's an older phone,
Speaker 1: so you've probably connected things over the years to it
Speaker 1: and something just doesn't seem to be playing right. So
Speaker 1: what I'd recommend is doing what's called a network settings reset.
Speaker 1: So you want to go into your Samsung phone, you
Speaker 1: want to go into your settings. You swipe down from
Speaker 1: the top. There's a little gear icon in the upper
Speaker 1: right hand corner. You tap that and then you'll be
Speaker 1: into your settings. Now, you scroll all the way down
Speaker 1: until it says general Management, and then you scroll all
Speaker 1: the way down again until it says reset. Now. I
Speaker 1: know it's scary because it says reset, so you probably
Speaker 1: didn't want to click that. But you can tap reset
Speaker 1: and then you get a bunch of reset options. Or
Speaker 1: you can do reset network settings and that will reset
Speaker 1: the Wi Fi, the mobile data, and the Bluetooth. That's
Speaker 1: the one I think you should tap. And so once
Speaker 1: you tap that, it will clear out all the Bluetooth devices,
Speaker 1: all the Wi Fi devices, all the connect devices on
Speaker 1: that phone. Then I would go in and I would
Speaker 1: repair the bow's headphones, and I think your connectivity issues
Speaker 1: will hopefully be solved. Mary Jane in Fallbrook, California. You're
Speaker 1: on with rich Oh, thank.
Speaker 12: You so much for taking my call. I have an
Speaker 12: old Apple six. It wasn't holding I loved it. It
Speaker 12: wasn't holding a charge anymore. So I went to your
Speaker 12: sponsor and I bought a new phone. And why the
Speaker 12: gentleman was transferring the information from one phone to the other.
Speaker 12: He says, what's your security code number? I don't know
Speaker 12: what he was talking about, don't. I went through some papers.
Speaker 12: I don't see anything in regard to that. I wondered,
Speaker 12: what do I do now? Both phones are inoperable and
Speaker 12: I don't know what security code it's not. Well, I'm confused.
Speaker 12: I just don't know what to do.
Speaker 1: Okay, So explain to me. You have an iPhone six,
Speaker 1: that's your phone. Are they both in your possession?
Speaker 13: Yes?
Speaker 1: Okay, And you have a new iPhone. What did you
Speaker 1: get a new iPhone?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 12: I just got a fifty. I got a new iPhone yet.
Speaker 1: A fifteen.
Speaker 12: I think they called it A fifty.
Speaker 1: Okay, uh, well the newest is the fifteen. Is the fifteen?
Speaker 1: So is it an iPhone?
Speaker 10: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Okay, great, all right, So I think what you're referring
Speaker 1: to a security code on your phone. So iPhone is
Speaker 1: very easy to you're trying to transfer all your data
Speaker 1: from the old phone to the new one.
Speaker 12: Well that's twenty pros. So that wasn't completed and I'm
Speaker 12: out two phones.
Speaker 1: Okay, do you have both phones in your possession?
Speaker 8: Yes?
Speaker 1: Okay, great, So what you want to do. The security
Speaker 1: code that is I believe is being referred to is
Speaker 1: your pin code, so you know how you code, Yes,
Speaker 1: the code that you use to unlock your old phone.
Speaker 1: When you go through the setup process on the iPhone
Speaker 1: to transfer your data for security reasons, it asks you
Speaker 1: what the pin code is on your old phone, and
Speaker 1: so you type that in and that enables the phone
Speaker 1: to decode your encrypted information off the old device. And
Speaker 1: so that's what I believe is happening here. That is
Speaker 1: the code. So whatever you type in and don't say
Speaker 1: it on air, but whatever you type in on your
Speaker 1: old phone, that's what you do. That's the code that
Speaker 1: you put in on the new phone. So typically throughout
Speaker 1: the little process of transferring all the data, it will say,
Speaker 1: please enter the security code or the pin code from
Speaker 1: your previous device, and so that's the code that you
Speaker 1: type in, and that will help the new phone gather
Speaker 1: the old data. So that's what I believe you could do. So,
Speaker 1: Mary Jean, thanks so much for calling today. I hope
Speaker 1: that that helps you figure it out. Let's go to
Speaker 1: John in more Park, California. John, you're on with Rich.
Speaker 13: I have a question.
Speaker 10: I have a friend of mine.
Speaker 13: He only has one thing.
Speaker 5: He has an iPhone.
Speaker 6: But I was going to ask your advice on passboard managers.
Speaker 1: Good question, password manager. I was just talking about this
Speaker 1: yesterday with a friend. So if he just has an iPhone,
Speaker 1: I think the easiest, simplest password manager is built right
Speaker 1: into the iPhone. It's called iCloud keychain, and if he's
Speaker 1: using the iPhone, iCloud keychain will generate strong passwords. If
Speaker 1: you're using an iPhone, you've probably seen this pop up
Speaker 1: on your phone where it says it literally puts like
Speaker 1: an email or a password in the box, like it's
Speaker 1: like this long character and you just have to tap
Speaker 1: to accept it. But iCloud keychain. If he's already using iPhone,
Speaker 1: I think is going to be the simplest way to
Speaker 1: do it. Now, when you're using more devices than just
Speaker 1: the iPhone, I think it gets a little bit more complicated.
Speaker 1: Then I would recommend something like bitwarden, b it wr
Speaker 1: d n Bitwarden. And what bitwarden does is it will
Speaker 1: generate a password, but you have to set it all up.
Speaker 1: You need to create an account, you need to set
Speaker 1: it up and make sure that the iPhone knows that
Speaker 1: that's what you want to use to fill on the accounts.
Speaker 1: That's a good way to go. If you're a big
Speaker 1: Google user, a Google Chrome on the iPhone and Google
Speaker 1: Chrome on the desktop, I would check out Google password manager,
Speaker 1: so they have one built in. You can go to
Speaker 1: passwords dot Google dot com. And Google just recently upgraded
Speaker 1: this password manager so that works even better on the iPhone.
Speaker 1: It used to be kind of not so easy, but
Speaker 1: now it actually will fill in passwords across all devices
Speaker 1: on the iPhone. And by the way, to check out
Speaker 1: how you're using the password manager on your iPhone, you
Speaker 1: go to settings and let's see, you go to passwords
Speaker 1: and it's going to authorize you and then you can
Speaker 1: see all the passwords that your iPhone has selected and
Speaker 1: kept inside there. I've got a list of a couple
Speaker 1: of them. But then if you go into password options,
Speaker 1: now you can specify how you want to save and
Speaker 1: also fill passwords on the iPhone. But that's what you
Speaker 1: want to do is set up I personally always appreciate
Speaker 1: third party products for everything, but John in your friend's case,
Speaker 1: since he's just or they're just using an iPhone, I
Speaker 1: think the iCloud keychain is probably gonna be the easiest.
Speaker 1: But keep in mind it is linked to your iCloud account,
Speaker 1: so if you forget your iCloud password, or if you
Speaker 1: can't get into your iCloud account, we're gonna have a
Speaker 1: lot of problems with all the other passports be able
Speaker 1: to get into those either. Rich on Tech dot tv
Speaker 1: is the website. If you want to contact the show,
Speaker 1: send your email there eighty eight rich one O one
Speaker 1: eight eight eight seven four to two four one zero.
Speaker 1: And we still got lots more of the show, lots
Speaker 1: more questions, lots more things to talk about. You're listening
Speaker 1: to rich on Tech. Welcome back to rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: Rich Demiro here hanging out with you talking technology. Some
Speaker 1: of you have discovered on the website at richontech dot
Speaker 1: TV that there is a microphone icon. You click the
Speaker 1: icon and you can leave a voicemail for the show.
Speaker 1: So I figured in this segment we would check the voicemail,
Speaker 1: and let's start with David.
Speaker 7: Hey.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was trying to find something on the new
Speaker 1: five G home Wi Fi.
Speaker 4: I'm trying to compare T Mobile, Verizon, and now AT
Speaker 4: and T is coming out with one, and I couldn't
Speaker 4: find anything on your site.
Speaker 1: And I know you do all this kind of stuff.
Speaker 3: Take care, keep up the good work.
Speaker 1: Great question. These new home internet services are provided through
Speaker 1: cellular versus a wired connection through something like your cable
Speaker 1: company or your phone company. So T Mobile has theirs,
Speaker 1: it's called T Mobile five G Home Internet, Verizon has
Speaker 1: Verizon five G Home Internet, and AT and T is
Speaker 1: the newest to offer it. They have AT and T
Speaker 1: Internet Air, which I think is the coolest name out
Speaker 1: of all of them. So again, if you have a
Speaker 1: strong cellular signal to your home, this might be a
Speaker 1: good alternative to a wired internet connection that you might
Speaker 1: get from, like I said, your cable company or your
Speaker 1: traditional phone company.
Speaker 10: Now.
Speaker 1: In some cases your phone company maybe Verizon, it may
Speaker 1: be AT, and T it may be T Mobile. So
Speaker 1: the main thing you need to do is check to
Speaker 1: see if these are available where you live. Have a
Speaker 1: friend come over with that signal on their smartphone. Use
Speaker 1: an app like Medior or speed test to test the
Speaker 1: signal up and down, see if it's strong, and then
Speaker 1: you can order this home internet. Maybe keep your old
Speaker 1: internet just in case there's a problem. Most of these
Speaker 1: systems are self installed. They send you a box, you
Speaker 1: plug it in near your window. It pulls in that
Speaker 1: cellular connection and then it spits it out as Wi
Speaker 1: Fi and then your devices would connect to that. So
Speaker 1: I think the connection through your wired internet is going
Speaker 1: to be faster, but I think the price is going
Speaker 1: to be better for this home internet situation. So you're
Speaker 1: going to get unlimited data from most of these companies.
Speaker 1: T Mobile right now is charging anywhere from thirty to
Speaker 1: fifty dollars, Verizon sixty to eighty dollars, AT and T
Speaker 1: fifty five dollars. Those prices do not include discounts for customers. Also,
Speaker 1: keep in mind if you're eligible for the Affordable Connectivity Program,
Speaker 1: these home internet services are eligible. That's a thirty dollars
Speaker 1: a month discount if you have something like Snap or
Speaker 1: you're on Medicaid. But like anything else, I predict the
Speaker 1: prices of these services will go up as more people
Speaker 1: get them. Right now, this is a very new thing.
Speaker 1: They've only been around for a couple of years now.
Speaker 1: I did have the chance to test out Verizons five
Speaker 1: G Home Internet and it was great. I tested out
Speaker 1: in various locations. The main thing is that if you
Speaker 1: have a good signal, you're gonna have a good Internet connection. Now,
Speaker 1: if you're doing a lot on your Internet at home,
Speaker 1: like if you're constantly exchanging large files, like if you're
Speaker 1: a video editor or something like that, I probably wouldn't
Speaker 1: recommend this. But if you're just doing typical day to
Speaker 1: day stuff like streaming Netflix and you know, doing your email,
Speaker 1: the stuff you typically do on your smartphone, if it
Speaker 1: works well on your smartphone, it's probably gonna work well
Speaker 1: on the five G home Internet.
Speaker 14: Next up, let's go to k I'm trying to figure
Speaker 14: out about Google Assistant interpret or mode. I've seen some
Speaker 14: demonstrations where you speak and then you can hand the
Speaker 14: phone to the other person and they will speak and
Speaker 14: you will hear both sides, but in my Google Assistant interpreter,
Speaker 14: I only get my side translated.
Speaker 3: Do you have anything like this you can help me with.
Speaker 1: What you're referring to is interpreter mode, and this is
Speaker 1: basically real time translation on your phone. This is the
Speaker 1: stuff that we saw in sci fi movies, but it
Speaker 1: is available if you have Google Assistant on Android or iOS.
Speaker 1: And this allows people to have back and forth conversations
Speaker 1: with each person speaking their own respective language, and Google
Speaker 1: will kind of be the in between and translate whatever
Speaker 1: you're saying. So, if you want to activate interpreter mode,
Speaker 1: there's a couple of ways you can do this. You
Speaker 1: can say, hey G, be my German translator, or hey G,
Speaker 1: help me speak Spanish. Replace the G with Google of course,
Speaker 1: and then that translated conversation will be displayed on the
Speaker 1: phone screen and also the device will speak it. Google
Speaker 1: supports forty four languages for this. Now, if you want
Speaker 1: to do another version of this, if you download the
Speaker 1: Google Translate app. Typically, when you use the app, you
Speaker 1: can just hit the big microphone icon and you can
Speaker 1: say something in your language and it will translate it
Speaker 1: into another language. But there's another icon in the lower
Speaker 1: left hand corner that says conversation And now if you
Speaker 1: put that on, it will listen to what you're saying
Speaker 1: and put your side of the conversation in your language,
Speaker 1: and then in real time translate that to the other side.
Speaker 1: And if you tap auto, this will make it so
Speaker 1: it's listening for both languages. So when you speak in
Speaker 1: your language, it will translate it to the other language,
Speaker 1: and when they speak in their language, it will translate
Speaker 1: it to your language. By the way, Apple has a
Speaker 1: translate app as well, so if you don't want to
Speaker 1: download a new app on the iPhone, you can just
Speaker 1: search for the translate app and it has similar features.
Speaker 1: All right, Next up, let's go to Jim.
Speaker 15: Hey Rich, this is Jim from Prescott Valley. For years
Speaker 15: I've uploaded pictures to Costco to make Christmas cards, and
Speaker 15: this year they just continue that service. I was wondering
Speaker 15: if you you had any suggestions on another place to
Speaker 15: upload and create cards. Thanks and great job with the
Speaker 15: podcast and the radio show.
Speaker 1: Ah. Yes, it is that time of year again when
Speaker 1: we need to order our holiday cards. So I think
Speaker 1: this is largely a question of how much you want
Speaker 1: to spend, the convenience and how much time you want
Speaker 1: to put into them. But I'll tell you the company
Speaker 1: that I've used for the past couple of years simply
Speaker 1: to impress dot Com. I believe they were a wirecutter
Speaker 1: pick at some point and we started trying them and
Speaker 1: we just kind of liked them. The other one that
Speaker 1: we use before that was Minted, which I really like.
Speaker 1: And I always look at the back of the cards
Speaker 1: when we get them over the holidays to see where
Speaker 1: people order their cards, and Minted is very popular. Shutterfly
Speaker 1: obviously very popular. The other place people get them is
Speaker 1: through the local drugstore, so a Walgreens, a CVS, a Target.
Speaker 1: I think it comes down to how much you want
Speaker 1: to spend, how fast you want to get them. But
Speaker 1: I will give you my tips. Number One, I always
Speaker 1: order these on Cyber Monday because I do believe that
Speaker 1: they have the best price of the year on Cyber Monday,
Speaker 1: no matter where you get them, So get those pictures
Speaker 1: ready because you only have a day or two to
Speaker 1: get those ready for Cyber Monday. Also, I never pay
Speaker 1: for the faster shipping at the end of your order.
Speaker 1: When you're all said and done, they're like, Oh, and
Speaker 1: by the way, do you want to wait like six
Speaker 1: weeks to get these or do you want them in
Speaker 1: two days? Of course, the temptation is to upgrade and
Speaker 1: pay a little bit more for that peace of mind
Speaker 1: that you're going to get them in time to send
Speaker 1: them out for the holidays. But I've never done that,
Speaker 1: and they always arrive faster than I think. Of course,
Speaker 1: because I'm telling you this, this is the year that
Speaker 1: that won't happen. But it's always worked out for me.
Speaker 1: I guess the only thing you have to figure out
Speaker 1: is if you want to include a little personal note
Speaker 1: with every picture. Next up in the voicemails, Josie, what is.
Speaker 3: A good free computer cleaner?
Speaker 1: You have to be careful when you're cleaning up your computer,
Speaker 1: but yes, you want your computer to run nice and fast,
Speaker 1: and sometimes these things do get bogged down. My number
Speaker 1: one piece of advice is to do some maintenance. So
Speaker 1: go into your settings, add and remove programs and get
Speaker 1: rid of any programs that you no longer use or recognize.
Speaker 1: Uninstall those, then restart your computer. See if that helps.
Speaker 1: Do the same thing on your web browser. Get rid
Speaker 1: of any extensions you don't use now when it comes
Speaker 1: to programs that are free, A lot of people like
Speaker 1: a program named bleach bit b l e ah bit
Speaker 1: and that will clean your system and free up disc space.
Speaker 1: Another very popular program is C Cleaner C Cleaner and
Speaker 1: that will speed up your PC. It won't do everything
Speaker 1: for free, it will basically just help speed up your computer.
Speaker 1: You can pay for more features after that. And if
Speaker 1: you're on the Mac side of things, the only thing
Speaker 1: that I use is called clean my Mac, and I
Speaker 1: don't believe it's completely free, but I do think they
Speaker 1: have a free level of certain features that you can use.
Speaker 1: Let's get to our last voicemail right now from Melissa
Speaker 1: Hi Rich.
Speaker 16: I just want to say you're so helpful and informative
Speaker 16: and even for a Gen X or splash millennial who
Speaker 16: thinks she knows some tech stuff. I you know, campare
Speaker 16: myself free tech savvy, but you have a lot. And
Speaker 16: also that segment on the ring and trying to get
Speaker 16: my parents to get a ring, what's very helpful.
Speaker 14: So you rock.
Speaker 1: Thank you well, Thank you Melissa for listening, thank you
Speaker 1: for learning, and I do appreciate the kind words. We'll
Speaker 1: have more of your calls and questions coming up right
Speaker 1: after this. Rich on Tech is where you can find
Speaker 1: me on social media. My name is rich Dmiro and
Speaker 1: you are doing something smart. You are listening to rich
Speaker 1: on Tech. Welcome back to rich on Tech. This is
Speaker 1: the show where I talk about the tech stuff I
Speaker 1: think you should know about. It's also the place where
Speaker 1: I answer your questions. My name is rich Demiro. You
Speaker 1: can find me on social media at rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: I'm on Instagram, Facebook X sometimes threads, mostly on Instagram Stories.
Speaker 1: That's really where I put a lot on my effort.
Speaker 1: But I realized it's funny. I've realized with Instagram Stories,
Speaker 1: you can't share my stories. So I share a lot
Speaker 1: of like useful information and it's great if you're a
Speaker 1: follower of mine, but if you're a follower, you can't
Speaker 1: share that out to other people. And so I've started
Speaker 1: to actually share stuff that I wouldn't typically share in
Speaker 1: the feed, like in the regular feed. I always thought
Speaker 1: that was just for like pictures and videos, but now
Speaker 1: I'm doing like tech stuff because you can actually share
Speaker 1: that information. So if you see something useful that I share,
Speaker 1: you can send it off to your friends on your stories,
Speaker 1: Whereas if I share that on my stories, you can't
Speaker 1: do that, so it's a small little change. But if
Speaker 1: you do follow me on Instagram. That is the reasoning
Speaker 1: behind why I'm starting to share more of my stuff
Speaker 1: on the main feed, because it just makes it easier.
Speaker 1: You can also listen to this show as a podcast.
Speaker 1: Be sure to subscribe. Just go to rich on tech
Speaker 1: dot tv click the podcast icon so show notes and
Speaker 1: links to everything I mentioned. You can also just search
Speaker 1: rich on tech in your favorite audio app. Of course,
Speaker 1: you can listen right here as well. Let's go to Linda.
Speaker 1: Linda is in Anaheim. Linda, you're on with Rich.
Speaker 8: Hi.
Speaker 1: Rich.
Speaker 8: I have the problems with facetimed group call that.
Speaker 13: It's happened to me twice to my family, and.
Speaker 8: I'm sorry, I'm old. I don't even know how to
Speaker 8: do a.
Speaker 13: FaceTime group call, and of course they don't think.
Speaker 1: That I did it.
Speaker 8: I was three feet away from my phone and I
Speaker 8: received a phone call, I thought, and it was almost
Speaker 8: all of my family, and they said I made the
Speaker 8: phone call. Oh wow, And of course they thought that
Speaker 8: it was an emergency. Oh no, one time once now
Speaker 8: what happened again? The other time I was on the
Speaker 8: phone speaking to someone and all.
Speaker 13: Of a sudden, I go, oh, let me call you back.
Speaker 8: I have a call from my grandson, and again it
Speaker 8: was a whole group of them and a couple of friends.
Speaker 1: Okay, well I think, I think I know what's happening.
Speaker 1: I think, well there is Okay, so this is happening
Speaker 1: when you're on the phone.
Speaker 13: It happened one time when I was not on the phone,
Speaker 13: and it happened one time when I was on the phone.
Speaker 1: Okay. So there is a a group FaceTime feature that
Speaker 1: is on the iPhone, relatively new as of a couple
Speaker 1: of years, where you can have up to I think
Speaker 1: thirty two people in the call. And so a couple
Speaker 1: of the ways you can start this is obviously from
Speaker 1: the FaceTime app, and that would take some time to
Speaker 1: open up the app and set up the call. But
Speaker 1: one of the other ways you can do this is
Speaker 1: through the messages app.
Speaker 10: And so no, I don't want to do that, No,
Speaker 10: I know, but.
Speaker 1: I'm saying, this is how it's happening to you, and
Speaker 1: I think this is this is my theory on what's happening.
Speaker 1: So I feel like, when you're on your phone, this
Speaker 1: is just a theory. By the way, I don't know
Speaker 1: if this is the exact way, but I feel like
Speaker 1: when you're on your phone, there is a FaceTime video
Speaker 1: button in the upper right hand corner, and that FaceTime
Speaker 1: video button could be pressed by your ear when your
Speaker 1: phone is up to your face, and I think that's
Speaker 1: what's happening. And so when you have a bunch of
Speaker 1: people in that group text, your ear is hitting that
Speaker 1: button and it's starting, it's initiating that call. So that's
Speaker 1: one theory. Another way you can start these calls is
Speaker 1: when you're in a text, if you tap the people
Speaker 1: up at the top, there's like a little kind of
Speaker 1: like an info area where it says you can call them,
Speaker 1: you can video chat them, you can mail them. So
Speaker 1: that could be another way that that is getting activated,
Speaker 1: and that's up at the top. So those are the
Speaker 1: two ways I think it's being initiated. If you don't
Speaker 1: want to use FaceTime and you don't want this to happen,
Speaker 1: you know, you can also set the autolock on your
Speaker 1: phone to be to be less of a time so
Speaker 1: it will lock quicker. You can also turn off FaceTime
Speaker 1: completely if you want, and you can turn off FaceTime
Speaker 1: by going into settings and then FaceTime and you can
Speaker 1: turn it off now. Of course that's going to make
Speaker 1: it so that you can't use FaceTime until you turn
Speaker 1: it back on eighty eight rich one on one eight
Speaker 1: eight eight seven four to two four one zero one.
Speaker 1: Blue Green sent me a DM on Instagram at rich
Speaker 1: On Tech and it was a scammer impersonating Sandra Bullock.
Speaker 1: And he said, Uh, why is this person trying so
Speaker 1: hard to meet me? What happens if I chat with them?
Speaker 1: Curious if they tried chatting with you? And what happens
Speaker 1: if you talk to them? And good question number one.
Speaker 1: I don't think you should engage with these people, these
Speaker 1: scam artists that you know they're impersonating someone else on Instagram, Facebook, whatever.
Speaker 1: But the bottom line is they are going to try
Speaker 1: to scam you. So I did this the other day
Speaker 1: a guy I know, he was you know, they set
Speaker 1: up a bogus account that looked just like his, grabbed
Speaker 1: his pictures and then he started chatting with me, and
Speaker 1: so of course I'm just curious. So I chatted with him.
Speaker 1: I said, Hey, how you doing, what's going on? I
Speaker 1: missed you at the last Apple event, you know, bl blah,
Speaker 1: blah blah, knowing he wasn't even there, and the person's like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, house work. And you know, we talked a
Speaker 1: little little niceties back and forth, and I kept trying
Speaker 1: to drop little things that I know only this person
Speaker 1: would know, the real person, that this scam artist wouldn't,
Speaker 1: but he kept ignoring those parts of the questioning anyway, Finally,
Speaker 1: what did he get to? Hey, I've been really getting
Speaker 1: into crypto, and you know, I think that it would
Speaker 1: be great for you to do this. And what do
Speaker 1: they want you to do? They want you to download
Speaker 1: some app, they want you to transfer some money. They
Speaker 1: want to scam you. Be careful, be aware. And it
Speaker 1: looks like someone you know, they're not asking for help,
Speaker 1: They're not, you know, just be aware. Let's go to Vanessa.
Speaker 1: Vanessa in Great Falls. You're on with rich I should
Speaker 1: say Great Falls Montana.
Speaker 11: I years and.
Speaker 17: Years ago, my first computer ever bought was a Gateway.
Speaker 1: Oh nice, I love gateways the cows and yeah, that
Speaker 1: started my oldest son on his pet career.
Speaker 17: And now I see that they've someone is making gateways again.
Speaker 17: And I recently bought two in one tablets laptops for
Speaker 17: my grandchildren that are three and five, but they can
Speaker 17: get started. Sure, what is the best way to set
Speaker 17: that up? So they only have access to the educational
Speaker 17: programs that we're putting on there for them.
Speaker 1: So this is a this is a Microsoft tablet or
Speaker 1: is it a computer? Microsoft?
Speaker 13: It's it's a two in one. You can fold the
Speaker 13: keyboard all the way back. It's almost like the surface
Speaker 13: go and you can hold the keyboard back and use
Speaker 13: it as a tablet or use the keyboard as a computer.
Speaker 1: Okay, so I've got this up for my kids, and
Speaker 1: I believe so on iOS you've got what's called screen Time.
Speaker 1: On Android, you've got what's called Family Link, and with Microsoft,
Speaker 1: I believe it is called Family Safety. And so you
Speaker 1: can set these up as you know, you can set
Speaker 1: them up as a parent or a grandparent to just
Speaker 1: allow them to do the things that you want these
Speaker 1: kids to do on there. So in most cases, and
Speaker 1: it's been a bit since I set these up for
Speaker 1: my kids, but I believe that you put in kind
Speaker 1: of like the age of your child that's accessing it,
Speaker 1: and it will kind of, you know, it'll set some
Speaker 1: defaults like here's the stuff will allow, here's the stuff
Speaker 1: we won't allow. But then you can also go further
Speaker 1: and you could say, let's say they like a certain
Speaker 1: website like PBS kids or something. You can allow that
Speaker 1: specifically on the list of websites. But it also gives
Speaker 1: you a rundown of what they search online if you
Speaker 1: choose to allow that, or you can of course block searches.
Speaker 1: You can limit the time that they spend on these
Speaker 1: different apps and things, and of course just make it
Speaker 1: so they can't install anything new. But that's really what
Speaker 1: it starts with, is this Microsoft Family Safety is getting
Speaker 1: that installed, setting it up. You may have to create
Speaker 1: an account for the child, but once you get that
Speaker 1: on there, you know you're in control now for the
Speaker 1: most part, because sometimes it can be a little tricky
Speaker 1: and be a little frustrating because once you set this up,
Speaker 1: there may be something the child wants to do on
Speaker 1: there where they can't easily do it because it has
Speaker 1: all these restrictions in place. But no matter what, if
Speaker 1: you are setting up I know there's a lot of
Speaker 1: parents that sort of give up on this stuff because
Speaker 1: it can be a little complicated to get set up,
Speaker 1: and so they say, you know what, nevermind, I'll just
Speaker 1: hand them the tablet or the phone or their laptop.
Speaker 1: But please do not do that because there is just
Speaker 1: too much that they can happen upon if you don't
Speaker 1: have these things locked down. And I'm not saying they're
Speaker 1: even looking for stuff, but it's a matter of things
Speaker 1: can be presented to them, or they may search for
Speaker 1: something and it may just bring up something that you
Speaker 1: don't want them to see or they shouldn't be seeing
Speaker 1: at their age. You are doing something smart today. You're
Speaker 1: listening to rich on Tech. Welcome back to rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: Rich Demiro here hanging out with you, talking technology and
Speaker 1: joining me now is Jacob Palmer of best Reviews dot com. Jacob,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining me.
Speaker 6: Thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1: All Right, so explain what Best Reviews is all about
Speaker 1: before we start talking about some of these items you
Speaker 1: identified as being great for holiday gifts.
Speaker 6: Yeah. So, we spend all year trying to connect people
Speaker 6: with the best products that are out there on the market,
Speaker 6: and we do that to figure out what is the best.
Speaker 6: We do that by testing side by side in real
Speaker 6: world environments, so we can tell people, you know, this
Speaker 6: is the best if that money can buy, this is
Speaker 6: the best if you're trying to save some money and
Speaker 6: you want to find the right value, and so we're
Speaker 6: always trying to connect people with the best products at
Speaker 6: the best prices. So this time of year is a
Speaker 6: huge time for us because all that testing we did
Speaker 6: around the clock all year long is now really coming
Speaker 6: to a head because this is when people want to
Speaker 6: get those absolute best products.
Speaker 1: Full disclosure, Best reviews dot Com is owned by the
Speaker 1: same company that I work for on TV called Nextstar.
Speaker 1: With that said, let's get to some of these recommendations.
Speaker 1: Let's start with Dyson products. These are a premium product.
Speaker 1: Why do you recommend these this holiday season?
Speaker 6: So the thing with Dyson is is that it's that
Speaker 6: high end brand name that people love and really want
Speaker 6: the hair shit, and this year we're expecting to see
Speaker 6: huge discounts on them. So if you're looking for either
Speaker 6: one of their top of the line vacuums or also
Speaker 6: they have great air purifiers. They also have a line
Speaker 6: of hair care products, whether it's blow dryers and things
Speaker 6: like that, they're all gonna be marked down and I
Speaker 6: think there's gonna be on a lot of people's lists.
Speaker 6: So this is definitely a time to look out for.
Speaker 1: That now, these have been around for a while, thorough gun.
Speaker 1: They sort of invented this genre of a massage gun.
Speaker 1: I guess you'd call it. What do you like about these?
Speaker 6: Yeah, personal percussion massage guns essentially is what it is.
Speaker 6: And what we love about it is that it's just
Speaker 6: a great gift because it's something that people don't think
Speaker 6: to buy for themselves. So we're always getting feedback. We're
Speaker 6: always trying to hear from different users, different testers, and
Speaker 6: what they gave in terms of gifts, and then what
Speaker 6: was the feedback and what was the reaction to it,
Speaker 6: And this always comes in as one of the absolute
Speaker 6: most popular gifts. It's a little bit more expensive, but
Speaker 6: for the last several years we've seen them do significant discounts.
Speaker 6: You know, I'm talking about a great or more dollars
Speaker 6: off on the full price. And so this is a
Speaker 6: great time of year to be able to get this
Speaker 6: and make somebody truly happy for when they're opening up
Speaker 6: their presence.
Speaker 1: This is a fun gift and something I got my kids,
Speaker 1: I believe last year. Fujifilm in stacks Mini twelve. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like a Polaroid, but for today's.
Speaker 6: Generation and what we've seen from today's generation is they're
Speaker 6: bringing back a lot of the cooler things of the
Speaker 6: nineties and this is, you know, recapturing that magic from
Speaker 6: when people would originally buy a polaroid and then the
Speaker 6: camera itself would spit out the image almost instantly. This
Speaker 6: allows the kids to be able to control their own space,
Speaker 6: create their own art hanging up in their walls. And
Speaker 6: it's not that expensive. It's a better piece of technology
Speaker 6: than what we were messing with in the nineties. But
Speaker 6: it's also, you know, really really popular right now because
Speaker 6: for some reason, what's old is new again. So this
Speaker 6: is a great one to consider for that nephew, you know,
Speaker 6: the grand kids in your life.
Speaker 1: One thing that hasn't changed though the film is still
Speaker 1: an expensive part.
Speaker 6: Of this, Yeah it is, and it's definitely something to
Speaker 6: consider when you're buying it.
Speaker 1: Go Pro so Hero.
Speaker 6: Eleven this is the latest go Pro. What do you
Speaker 6: like about this device? This is a great product for
Speaker 6: that person in your life who's doing cool things. The
Speaker 6: mountain climber, the person who loves to go surfing, loves
Speaker 6: to hit the slopes and go skiing or snowboarding, and
Speaker 6: so this most recent one is great because they've added
Speaker 6: stabilization features to it. It shoots in really clear picture.
Speaker 6: It's also incredibly durable. You know, we were testing it,
Speaker 6: taking it down the mountain, we were testing it going
Speaker 6: surfing and doing all these things. But then you see
Speaker 6: the footage and you're like, I instantly get why people
Speaker 6: want these and why we always say that these are
Speaker 6: really cool for people doing cool things.
Speaker 1: Now, this is not necessarily technology, but it was made
Speaker 1: popular through social media and TikTok. The Jumra cloud slippers.
Speaker 1: Why do you like these so much? So?
Speaker 6: These are great, but they're just the most comfortable house
Speaker 6: slipper you'll ever have. And it's you know, they're rubber
Speaker 6: and they don't look like much, but when you put
Speaker 6: your foot in it and you walk around the house,
Speaker 6: it really does feel like you're walking on a cloud,
Speaker 6: which is why they're called that. And you know, for
Speaker 6: only at full price there about forty dollars. I expect
Speaker 6: over the holiday shopping peak when things are really marked down,
Speaker 6: they'll probably be available for fifteen or twenty bucks. And
Speaker 6: it's another one of these things when we get our
Speaker 6: user feedback, we've never had somebody say bad things about them.
Speaker 6: And they only say, I've replaced all of my other
Speaker 6: house slippers and these are the ones I'm walking around on.
Speaker 1: The Kindle is always a popular gift during the holiday
Speaker 1: season for people that like to read. The Kindlescribe, I
Speaker 1: think is the newest model. It's got the biggest screen.
Speaker 1: You can write on it. What do you like about this?
Speaker 6: So this is perfect for the college students, the person
Speaker 6: who's actively learning because it allows you for the first
Speaker 6: time to annotate and really do it easily. You know,
Speaker 6: it's not clicking in and then typing, and it's not complicated.
Speaker 6: You're literally just writing on the screen. And so it's
Speaker 6: great for that person who's learning and reading a lot
Speaker 6: and needs to be able to write in the margins.
Speaker 6: So we love the Kindle for this person's well because
Speaker 6: also helps them kind of consolidate and not to have
Speaker 6: to have too many books going at once.
Speaker 1: And I will add when the Kindlescribe first came out,
Speaker 1: the reviews or mixed, but it was mostly because of
Speaker 1: the software. And Amazon has continually evolved the software on
Speaker 1: this device to make it better. For the golf lover
Speaker 1: in your life. You've got a couple of Garmin products
Speaker 1: to recommend tell me about the R ten and the rangefinder.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so these are products for that person who's really
Speaker 6: growing their love of the game and embracing it in
Speaker 6: big ways. The R ten is for somebody who wants
Speaker 6: to fill out there at home practice setup that maybe
Speaker 6: they've already got a net, they want to get some
Speaker 6: data on what their shots are doing. It's an awesome
Speaker 6: beginner's model.
Speaker 8: You know.
Speaker 6: It's way more affordable than what you're going to see
Speaker 6: in all the competitors, so a lot of people don't
Speaker 6: want to spend thousands and thousands of dollars. This is
Speaker 6: a way to get that kind of technology for five
Speaker 6: hundred tested out, see if you like it. And then
Speaker 6: they also have a really interesting product which is their
Speaker 6: rangefinder that you mentioned. That is interesting because it uses
Speaker 6: augmented reality. So when you're looking through the rangefinder, you're
Speaker 6: not just seeing what's in front of you, but you
Speaker 6: can also see the map of the whole and you
Speaker 6: can see, you know, the bunker. It automatically is telling
Speaker 6: you you're this close to that bunker and that water trap.
Speaker 6: So it adds a lot of different features that I
Speaker 6: think is pretty innovative in terms of what we're seeing
Speaker 6: from golf products, especially in the rangefinder space.
Speaker 1: Now, you brought a fun little toy called the Bitsy
Speaker 1: and I had not seen this, but I'm always on
Speaker 1: the lookout for kind of a fun, unique techie toy,
Speaker 1: and this fits all the bills.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's really interesting and it's what we're expecting to
Speaker 6: be the it holiday toy this year, so the one
Speaker 6: that everybody's going to be talking about, whether you understand
Speaker 6: it or not. And it's just a fun little device
Speaker 6: that has a kind of mini little projector on it
Speaker 6: and it puts interesting photos in front of you, interesting
Speaker 6: little kind of illustrations for the kid to love and all.
Speaker 6: You know, again, we use testers in real life environments,
Speaker 6: so we were giving this to a four year old
Speaker 6: and he just spent hours just playing with it, even
Speaker 6: if it is super simple. And the thing that parents
Speaker 6: love about it is is that it's not a screen,
Speaker 6: so you're not dealing with some of the same effects
Speaker 6: of you know, uh, putting an iPad, you know, giving
Speaker 6: him an iPad, giving them a different kind of tablet.
Speaker 6: So it's it's popular for both the kids and the parents,
Speaker 6: is what we found so far. What's the price point
Speaker 6: on the bits b it he Ze. It's fairly affordable,
Speaker 6: you know, it's not going to be overly expensive. So
Speaker 6: it's one of these things that during the holiday period
Speaker 6: we're expecting to see it for less than fifty dollars.
Speaker 1: Nestub Max from Google is a product that's been around
Speaker 1: for a while, but it does so many different things.
Speaker 1: What I love about it is that it displays my
Speaker 1: personal photo collection.
Speaker 6: What do you like about it? So it does that right,
Speaker 6: and that's always a really popular gift is the smart
Speaker 6: photo frind. But it also it has a solid speaker
Speaker 6: on it. It also you can use it for a
Speaker 6: normal just kind of at home voice assistance, so you
Speaker 6: keep it in the kitchen and you're able to use
Speaker 6: it as timers. You're able to have it show you,
Speaker 6: you know, how do I dice an onion? And then
Speaker 6: it'll show you in real time. And then it also
Speaker 6: has a camera on it so it can host video chatting,
Speaker 6: which is great for folks that want to be able
Speaker 6: to set something up in the home of maybe a
Speaker 6: less tech savvy person in their life and still be
Speaker 6: able to share those moments, still be able to connect.
Speaker 6: So we love it for all those reasons, But the
Speaker 6: number one reason why we love it and why it's
Speaker 6: in all of our holiday gift guides is it can
Speaker 6: be easily paired and command a smart thermostat, so you
Speaker 6: can save money on your heating bill, which you know,
Speaker 6: as those prices continue to rise, it's a great way
Speaker 6: to kind of control what you can control and limit
Speaker 6: a cost where you can.
Speaker 1: So we love it for that as well, and always
Speaker 1: a favor. I probably get more questions about this product
Speaker 1: than anything else at this point. The Apple Watch.
Speaker 6: What we're seeing is that they're just truly, truly popular.
Speaker 6: What we found in our testing. We have been testing
Speaker 6: the brand new model, the nine, and we like it,
Speaker 6: but we do think right now for this holiday season
Speaker 6: we're recommending looking at the slightly you know, earlier version.
Speaker 6: We love the Ultra, and then we also really like
Speaker 6: the eight because it's just smooth, it's effective, and like
Speaker 6: you said, it's going to be more discounted this holiday period.
Speaker 6: So if you're looking to save money and when you're
Speaker 6: in the market for Apple products, that's not a bad idea.
Speaker 6: You know, we are thinking right now in terms of
Speaker 6: our testing that we're gonna recommend going for a slightly
Speaker 6: older version because you're still going to get a great product.
Speaker 1: Jacob Palmer of best Reviews dot com. You can find
Speaker 1: all of their reviews and deals at the website best
Speaker 1: Reviews dot com. Thanks so much for joining me and thanks.
Speaker 7: For having me.
Speaker 6: You know, this year's cyber Monday is going to be
Speaker 6: a last call for saving. After that, a lot of
Speaker 6: the companies are going to be taking the prices high again.
Speaker 6: So you know, I understand if you wait. I wait
Speaker 6: things out all the time, but you can't expect to
Speaker 6: pay high or if you don't shop by cyber linking.
Speaker 1: All right, there you have it, Get those deals while
Speaker 1: they're hot. More rich on Tech coming your way right
Speaker 1: after this. Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich Demiro
Speaker 1: here hanging out with you, talking technology, and if you
Speaker 1: can believe it, now it is time for the feedback segment.
Speaker 1: These are the emails, the comments, and the questions I
Speaker 1: have gotten from you, and if you'd like to submit yours,
Speaker 1: just go to rich on Tech dot tv and hit
Speaker 1: the contact link. Yes, you take advantage of this. Thank
Speaker 1: you for all of your emails throughout the week. While
Speaker 1: you're on the website, you can follow me on social media.
Speaker 1: I am at rich on Tech on Instagram, Facebook, threads,
Speaker 1: and pretty much any social media platform. And if you
Speaker 1: like what you hear on the radio show, be sure
Speaker 1: to watch my TV segments. I cover a variety of
Speaker 1: tech topics. Just go to rich on tech dot tv
Speaker 1: to watch those. You can also find them on YouTube. Okay,
Speaker 1: without further ado, let's get to some of the feedback.
Speaker 1: Michael says, I ordered the new iPhone fifteen promacs and
Speaker 1: would like to control the camera zoom now five times
Speaker 1: optical and focus from an external controller. I plan on
Speaker 1: using the phone in a small rig case and would
Speaker 1: like precise control over the camera functions. Love the show well,
Speaker 1: I told Michael I was not aware of a controller
Speaker 1: for the iPhone that would do this, but apparently he
Speaker 1: found one because he updated me with a new email
Speaker 1: and said, hey, I found a solution for the wireless
Speaker 1: lens control for an iPhone camera. It is called the
Speaker 1: Nucleus Wireless Lens Control and he sent along a link
Speaker 1: from BH Photo and Video. It's expensive one hundred and
Speaker 1: sixty nine dollars, but it looks like it is a
Speaker 1: handwheel controller that will control the iPhone, and he says
Speaker 1: the black Magic Camera app will work as well with
Speaker 1: the controller, So there you go. That is definitely a
Speaker 1: pro setup. I think most people are just gonna pinch
Speaker 1: to zoom on their screen, but that is a great
Speaker 1: way to go. I'm glad you found that, Michael, and
Speaker 1: we can share. Let's see. Leanne via Instagram says, I
Speaker 1: really enjoy your show on KFI. Your format and demeanor
Speaker 1: while explaining tech is refreshing. Well, thank you, LeAnn. KFI
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles, of course, one of our popular stations,
Speaker 1: and of course where I'm based. Let's see. Dave via
Speaker 1: Instagram says, upon your review recommendation, I just purchased Super
Speaker 1: Mario Wonder for my nephew and my daughter. They're playing it.
Speaker 1: They're having a blast, So there you go. All right, Yes,
Speaker 1: that is a great game, and it's even been on
Speaker 1: sale throughout some of these Cyber Monday Black Friday specials,
Speaker 1: so see if you can get it at a discount.
Speaker 1: Greg says, listen to your podcast and heard you talk
Speaker 1: about the Mint application shutting down at the end of
Speaker 1: the year. You give a list of alternatives, but I
Speaker 1: want to give you one more for Windows ten Slash eleven.
Speaker 1: It's called Greg's Budget. It's available on the Microsoft Store
Speaker 1: for thirty dollars with no subscription fees. I've been using
Speaker 1: it for years to stay on budget and plan for
Speaker 1: the future. Full disclosure, I did write this application, so
Speaker 1: I'm a little biased, but it is a great app.
Speaker 1: All right. Well, there you go Greg's Budget on the
Speaker 1: Microsoft Store. Yes, a lot of people looking for alternatives
Speaker 1: to Mint, and what I've seen is that almost all
Speaker 1: of them are paid this time around. So it's kind
Speaker 1: of odd to pay anywhere from thirty to one hundred
Speaker 1: dollars a year for budgeting. But that is I guess,
Speaker 1: the new reality here. Let's see here via Instagram. Hey, rich,
Speaker 1: my brother is reporting I'm getting a lot of scam
Speaker 1: attempts on Venmo. Don't fall for it. Someone will send
Speaker 1: you one hundred dollars and claim it's an accident and
Speaker 1: they will ask for you to send the money back.
Speaker 1: Do not fall for it. There are YouTube videos on it.
Speaker 1: It's usually from a stolen account. It's money that will
Speaker 1: end up being retrieved once the victim reports it, which
Speaker 1: leaves you without the money that you quote unquote sent back.
Speaker 1: Just an FYI, thanks love your work. Yes, so many
Speaker 1: of these scams on all these payment systems, whether it's Zell,
Speaker 1: whether it's Venmo, whether it's PayPal. If someone's offering to
Speaker 1: send you money and then says it's a mistake, or
Speaker 1: they send you money and they say can you send
Speaker 1: back and they send you more than they should and
Speaker 1: you got to send back the difference. No matter what,
Speaker 1: it's all a scam. Do not fall for it. It's
Speaker 1: too good to be true. You're trying to get free money.
Speaker 1: Some people are greedy, They're going to fall for it.
Speaker 1: Do not fall for it. Jason says, thanks for the
Speaker 1: article about the Zumo. You can't get cloud storage through
Speaker 1: Spectrum unless you have a cable box. The joys of
Speaker 1: cable companies. One step forward, nine steps back. Maybe someday
Speaker 1: they will figure it out. Enjoy your radio show on KFI. So, Jason,
Speaker 1: I had to check with Spectrum because I didn't think
Speaker 1: that was the case. Why would they make you have
Speaker 1: a cable box when the whole point of this zo
Speaker 1: is to replace your cable box. So I did confirm
Speaker 1: you can get cloud storage through the zoomo box. So
Speaker 1: I'm not sure where you're getting your information, but check
Speaker 1: it out again because Apparently you can get cloud storage,
Speaker 1: cloud DVR through Spectrum through the Zoomo box, and that
Speaker 1: is x Umo, So check it out again. It's uh
Speaker 1: if you didn't catch the coverage on the Zoomo box.
Speaker 1: It's kind of a mix of a streaming box like
Speaker 1: an Apple TV, but a cable box as well. Of course,
Speaker 1: there is no cable box and everything is delivered through
Speaker 1: the internet. So if you're sticking with cable and you
Speaker 1: have Spectrum or Exfinity through Comcast, this is sort of
Speaker 1: a joint venture. It's their way of kind of putting
Speaker 1: out a box that's like a fire TV or a
Speaker 1: Roku or an Apple TV, but it is the cable
Speaker 1: company's brand and it's called Zumo x Umo. Neil says, hey, Rich,
Speaker 1: interesting story that you told someone following for sending money
Speaker 1: I need is someone they don't know in order to
Speaker 1: clear up an account problem. How many stupidities are on
Speaker 1: that call? Let someone control your computer. The other common
Speaker 1: thing is I will send you extra money and we
Speaker 1: need to send some of it back, and you will
Speaker 1: have to send some of it back. Of course you
Speaker 1: will lose on that when the initial transaction is canceled.
Speaker 1: We know that support numbers on Google are often fake
Speaker 1: numbers and ads. Basically, this person is falling for everything
Speaker 1: you tell us about online selling cash when the person
Speaker 1: arrives to pick up the goods, Facebook marketplace is a jungle. Neil, Yes, Neil,
Speaker 1: these are all the things I talk about. Not everyone
Speaker 1: is aware of everything, And yes, there are always going
Speaker 1: to be people that fall for this stuff. So that
Speaker 1: is just the way it is, Charles. That's why you
Speaker 1: listen to this show, so you understand this stuff and
Speaker 1: you don't fall for it. Oh more comments about the
Speaker 1: Zumo box, Hey Rich, the Zumo streaming box is not
Speaker 1: ready for prime time. I picked up two to replace
Speaker 1: my set top boxes. Things went smoothly but took some time.
Speaker 1: I have Max and Showtime any Time as part of
Speaker 1: my Spectrum package. Activating Max was frustratingly slow. The Showtime
Speaker 1: Anytime app was nowhere to be found, so I called
Speaker 1: Zumo Tech Help as Spectrum. She was pleasant, but knew
Speaker 1: very little about the box. After being put on hold
Speaker 1: several times, it turns out some Zumo boxes have Showtime Anytime,
Speaker 1: some don't. That's odd, but they don't know which ones
Speaker 1: have it and which ones don't. Also, you can't add
Speaker 1: apps to the Zoomo box like you can other streaming boxes.
Speaker 1: Spectrum solution was to keep exchanging Zoomo boxes until I
Speaker 1: had one that had the Showtime Anytime on it. Spectrum's
Speaker 1: excuse was that these Zumo boxes are new and they're
Speaker 1: still learning. Seriously. Needless to say, I returned them via
Speaker 1: the UPS store, and then I was off to Walmart
Speaker 1: for a couple of Roku Expresses for twenty four dollars each.
Speaker 1: They may not have all the bells and whistles that
Speaker 1: the Zumo box has, but set up was easier and faster,
Speaker 1: adding apps as possible, and navigating it was at least
Speaker 1: as quick as it was on Zumo. The box has potential,
Speaker 1: but it should not have been sold until its obvious
Speaker 1: short cummings are fixed and until spectrums Zoomo tech help
Speaker 1: people are familiar with it. Well, it's odd that they
Speaker 1: would not have showtime Anytime. I know that showtime has
Speaker 1: been mixed into Paramount Plus, so maybe you'd find it there.
Speaker 1: But I agree, I think that these boxes are good. Again,
Speaker 1: if you want to keep cable and you like that
Speaker 1: idea of cable, maybe we have time for one more.
Speaker 1: Walt says, interesting comments about the Rivian. They do look cool.
Speaker 1: The price involved is truly the highest negative. That seems
Speaker 1: to be skip slash missed. Who in the population is
Speaker 1: truly spending fifty thousand dollars plus on a vehicle, let
Speaker 1: alone one hundred k? Or is this truly a leasing situation? Walt? Finally,
Speaker 1: one more, Sarafim says, looking for several solutions. I take
Speaker 1: videos and pictures with a Samsung S twenty three Ultra.
Speaker 1: I need a better input tool, but need software to
Speaker 1: slow down the UAPs and morphing beings, apply motion tracking
Speaker 1: and zoom in and out. Sarahfim, I have no idea
Speaker 1: what you're talking about. I had to look this up.
Speaker 1: Unidentified anomalists phenomena morphing beings that can change their form
Speaker 1: or identity. It will Some examples include shape shifters. Oooh,
Speaker 1: this is way above my pay grade. I don't know
Speaker 1: what you're talking about, but yes, sometimes when you aim
Speaker 1: a camera on a smartphone at a bright light, you
Speaker 1: do sometimes see a floating orb in the picture. That
Speaker 1: is something that is common based on the small lenses.
Speaker 1: Maybe you're seeing more than the rest of us. In
Speaker 1: that case, be careful out there, all right, that's gonna
Speaker 1: do it. For this episode of the show. You can
Speaker 1: find links to everything I mentioned on my website. Just
Speaker 1: go to Rich on tech dot tv for the show notes.
Speaker 1: Happy shopping, and research those deals before you jump on them.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening. There are so many ways
Speaker 1: you can spend your time. I do appreciate you spending
Speaker 1: it right here with me. Thanks to everyone who makes
Speaker 1: this show possible. My name is Rich Dmiro. I will
Speaker 1: talk to you very soon.